Leiden and the Netherlands Centre for Biodiversity!

On Friday, Steef Eman, Director of the Central College Abroad Program, gave us a city tour of Leiden. Afterwards, we visited a science museum to advance our knowledge of biodiversity.

According to Steef, Leiden is the city that is the highest point of the Netherlands, which suggest that the city is the safest city to live in, because it is not as far below sea level as the rest of the country. There are many windmills that can be adjusted to catch the winds flowing in various directions, to fight against floods or to convert mechanical energy to electrical energy. The Rhine River flows through the city, and the Roman Empire claimed that everything north of the river was considered part of the empire. Everything south of the river was considered worthless because barbarians, who were considered to be fairly uneducated and wore beards, were not capable of speaking Latin. Leiden was one of the first places where one could bridge the Rhine, and it began to evolve into a small market town at the turn of the millennium.

Figure 1: A windmill in Leiden. This windmill in this photo is a museum, but later in the tour, Steef actually showed us a windmill that actually disconnects from the ground and turns to catch winds in the right direction.

Figure 2: The Rhine River.

Figure 3: Rambrant was born in Leiden, so his school is still here along with this memorial to commemorate his existence as a famous Dutch painter.

Figure 4: Here’s the Rapenburg building. Steef mentioned how this building was strong enough to withstand winds so gardens can grow. Unfortunately, the gardens are no longer visible in front of the building, but this building protected the gardens when they were there.

Figure 5: Here’s an image of the interior of the most significant church in Leiden. Steef mentioned how important people in America come to this church to deliver a speech or sermon. The last important American who did so was President Bush Senior. It appears that churches are the place to give an inspiring speech of some sort.

The next place we visted was the Netherlands Centre for Biodiversity NCB Naturalis. I was most interested in their biotechnology section since it was most related to what I studied, and it was a good ereview to see how bioreactors are used to grow useful biomaterial! For example, exnzymes can be used to wash out jeans to produce a warn look, and these enzymes are produced in a bioreactor. Within the bioreactor, the bacteria have an additional gene inserted into them so that these enzymes can produce the same stonewashed look that stonewashing produces when using real stones in a washing machine. This method seems to provide a less expensive and quick way of achieving the same stonewashed effect!

Figure 6: An example of a bioreactor.