Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index The University of Leicester is a red-brick university based in Leicester, England, with about 10,000 full-time students. The main campus is not far away from the city centre and is adjacent to Victoria Park and Wyggeston and Queen Elizabeth I College. University of Leicester seen from Victoria Park It was founded as Leicestershire and Rutland College in 1918 in the memory of those who lost their life in World War I. The university motto "Ut vitam habeant" - 'so that they may have life' - reminds one of that origin. Students were first admitted in 1921. In 1927, after it became University College, Leicester, students sat the examinations for external degrees of London University. In 1957 the college was granted its Royal Charter and has since then the status of a University with the right to award its own degrees. It is notable for its research. Genetic fingerprinting was developed at Leicester, and it has built space probes, most notably the Mars lander Beagle 2, in collaboration with the Open University. Table of contents 1 Famous alumni 2 External links 3 See also Famous alumni Bob Mortimer Sir John Stevens C. P. Snow Malcolm Bradbury External links University of Leicester See also De Montfort University UK topics National Space Centre This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.