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VGTU and CERN’S meeting matures vision of partnership

VGTU and CERN’S meeting matures vision of partnership

April 10, 2015

The delegation of Vilnius Gediminas Technical University (VGTU) met the leaders of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (from the French language: Organisation européenne pour la recherche nucléaire, known as CERN) and discussed the possibilities of cooperation.

Alfonsas Daniūnas, the Rector of VGTU, Asta Radzevičienė, the Vice-Rector for International Relations and Antanas Čenys, the Vice-Rector for Research, met Rolf-Dieter Heuer, the Director General of the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN, and Rudiger Voss, the Head of International Relations of the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN, as well as the leaders of laboratories and research centres. The representatives of VGTU visited several CERN laboratories and research centres, and learnt about their recent scientific and experimental activities going on at the European Organization for Nuclear Research.

"CERN is world famous for its projects in the field of physics. Taking into consideration their interest in technical universities, we hope that the contacts, established during the visit, will grow into a strong partnership not only in physics but also in the field of engineering," – said A. Daniūnas, the Rector of VGTU. During this visit, they discussed cooperation activities between Lithuania and CERN and programmes of internships as well as other projects. One of the planned projects in the nearest future is the "CERN Campus" in Vilnius, to be organized by Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, together with the Ministry of Education and Science and the Academy of Sciences of Lithuania. During the camp, CERN experts, researchers and scientists will share their experiences with students of information technologies and computer science.

The CERN laboratory is the world's largest particle physics laboratory, which at the beginning of April, after a two year‘s break restarted their ‘‘Big Bang‘‘ Large Hadron Collider. On September 29, 1954, twelve countries signed the CERN Treaty. Currently, CERN unites twenty-one member state; however, it has the cooperation agreements with more states, Lithuania among them, too. More than six-hundred universities and institutes around the world are using CERN's facilities and data. More than ten thousand visiting scientists from one hundred thirteen countries have already carried out CERN'S research and experiments.

The Permanent Mission of the Republic of Lithuania to the United Nations Office and other international organisations in Geneva and Ambassador Rytis Paulauskas organized the visit to CERN for the Lithuanian delegation, headed by Svetlana Kauzonienė, the Vice-Minister of Ministry of Education and Science of Lithuania. During the trip to Switzerland, they planned to visit the headquarters of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). All these institutions act as a platform for discussions with the State and academic institutions for the promotion of education and research, technological development, research and innovation implementation, commercial application, vocational training and other areas.

Photo credit: CERN