Videos

"Everything in the universe is made of math, including you" says the renowned cosmologist Max Tegmark. Jan Rombouts shares the same conviction: in his doctoral thesis he does not look at the cell cycle of living beings from the perspective of biology, but pours it into mathematical equations in order to gain a better understanding of the wondrous functioning of the cell.

Elien Bellon tries to find out how we can help children calculate better without letting them repeat math tables over and over again. Does the solution come from Socrates, who states that "true knowledge is to know oneself"?

Jan-Pieter D'Anvers keeps secrets. Your secrets. Think of your bank card code or your e-mails. He develops encryption algorithms to secure electronic communication and transactions.

The older we get, the worse we usually sleep. Julie Vanderlinden (KU Leuven) is therefore investigating whether exercise has a positive effect on sleep and the health of the elderly.

Despite recent advances in breast cancer treatment, too many women still die once this cancer has spread throughout their body. That's why Matteo Rossi is looking to find weaknesses of breast cancer cells, in order to defeat them.

Did you know that Belgium has the dubious honour of being a leader in the use of sleep and sedative medication worldwide? Kristien Coteur is investigating how she can support patients and their doctors in phasing out sleep medication.

Extremely premature babies often need to be resuscitated at birth. While this might help them to survive, they will sometimes live on with severe disabilities. Is resuscitation therefore always in the best interest of the babies? Alice Cavolo wants to help parents and physicians in making this extremely difficult decision.

When do you sexually desire your partner? That's what Sofia Prekatsounaki (KU Leuven) is looking into for her doctoral research.

Did you know that 80 million people worldwide have epilepsy? Thanks to genetically engineered zebrafish such as Didy, Annelii Ny (KU Leuven) hopes to find new drugs to treat these patients.

"5", "five" and "*****" are just the same, aren't they? Well, not exactly: while these symbolic and non-symbolic notations refer to the same magnitude, our brain processes the digit "5", the word "five" and the dot configuration differently. Mila Marinova looks into the psychology behind number processing. Such knowledge can help to make learning mathematics easier for children.

A cochlear implant makes it possible for the deaf and hearing impaired to hear well. This is a wonderful invention, but it requires some work to properly set up and keep the device up to date. But Ben Somers has a solution for that!

Ever heard of Dravet's syndrome? This rare condition occurs in 1 in 20,000 people and causes problems with walking, among other things. Lore Wyers (UAntwerpen - KU Leuven) is going the extra mile to help children with Dravet syndrome to walk better again. The first 'step': analysing their step pattern.