On September 30, 2025, the first Language Café organized by the COLOURS Project was held at Ventspils University of Applied Sciences. The event gathered international and local students in a relaxed and informal environment to practice languages (Mainly Latvian Language for now), exchange cultures, and foster connections across study programs. The event took place at student lounge, bringing together students from more than 6 different nationalities and speakers of a wide variety of languages, including English, Latvian, French, German, and Russian. The Language Cafe was designed to support student integration and intercultural communication, two key focus areas of COLOURS. During the event, participants engaged in small-group conversations guided by Lasma Asme, the EDI coordinator. The atmosphere was lively and inclusive, with background music by Liva Slesare, allowing students to gain confidence in speaking while enjoying snacks and refreshments prepared by the EDI coordinator. “The participation from both Latvian and international students exceeded our expectations,” commented Janvier Dylan, COLOURS representative and International student “It was inspiring to see how open and engaged everyone was, especially how many Latvian students were eager to communicate and connect across cultures. The energy and motivation to continue this kind of event were remarkable.” The event concluded with students dividing into small groups, where Latvian participants taught international students common words and phrases useful for everyday communication. This interactive exchange created a lively and friendly atmosphere that encouraged mutual learning. The session ended with an open discussion about future activities, during which students shared creative ideas for how upcoming café meetings could look. Many also expressed interest in volunteering and helping to organise the next events, highlighting their motivation to make the Language Cafe a regular and sustainable part of campus life the organisers noted that the success of the first Language Café demonstrates the importance of creating spaces that encourage communication, collaboration, and cultural exchange beyond the classroom. The next Language Café is planned for 29th October 2025, and all VeA students, international and local, are welcome to join.

Ventspils University of Applied Sciences invites students, staff, and the community to join Erasmus Days 2025 on October 22nd at 5:00 PM in the Lounge Room (D0) for an unforgettable evening of fun, culture, and connection. The event will feature a variety of interactive stations and activities, offering everyone a chance to test their knowledge, explore new cultures, and win exciting prizes. Whether you’re an Erasmus+ participant, an international student, or simply curious about global exchange, this celebration is the perfect opportunity to learn, engage, and connect. To keep the energy high, the evening will include snacks, live music, and plenty of good vibes – all in the spirit of bringing people together from across the world. Don’t miss your chance to celebrate Erasmus Days 2025 with us! Come share the Erasmus spirit, make new friends, and experience the joy of international exchange.

On October 9 and 10, at Ventspils University of Applied Sciences, in cooperation with Jan Dlugosz University in Poland, CoLab “More Than Words: (Inter)Linguistic Aspects in a Practical Context” took place. During the forum, participants discussed topics such as the interaction between language and technology, the impact of artificial intelligence on translation, cultural and identity aspects, current issues in language policy, and the challenges of communication in a multilingual society. Keynote lectures were delivered by speakers from several countries - Ramunė Kasperė from Lithuania, who outlined the future prospects of the translator’s profession in the age of artificial intelligence; Andrejs Veisbergs from the University of Latvia, who addressed issues of censorship in Latvian literary translations; and Olga Słabońska from Poland, who analyzed the grammatical structures of Polish and English from a cognitive perspective. Forum participants were eager to explore current topics from the perspectives of different lecturers and to gain valuable insights, which encouraged a broader understanding of the role of language, culture, and communication in contemporary society. At the end of the first day, all interested participants had the opportunity to visit the Ventspils Open-Air Museum to explore Latvia’s national cultural heritage – the Livonian language – together with Dženeta Marinska, a speaker of Livonian. The lecture concluded with a crossword activity, where participants searched for Livonian names of everyday objects around the museum grounds, followed by a tasting of traditional sklandrauši and smoked flounder from Kolka.  “The Livonian language lecture was truly inspiring – Dženeta spoke about both the history of the Livonian language and her personal journey of learning it. During the lecture, we also listened to Livonian folk songs and experienced the unique sound of the language. This experience made me reflect on the value and fragility of our own language – how easily it could disappear if we do not protect and use it in our daily lives,” shared participant Lelde Bērziņa. As part of the forum, COLOURS Alliance student workshops were also held, where students worked on practical tasks related to digital translation tools, intercultural communication, and foreign language learning. The forum concluded with a panel discussion titled “The Humanities: New Trends, Changes, and the Future.” More photos are available here: https://zviedrans.lv/klientiem/ Beyond Words: (Inter)Lingual Reflections in Practice October 9-10 | Ventspils, Latvia Password: beyondwordsventspils

A wide US – Europe network of radio telescopes including observing a faraway radio galaxy discovers a small dark object. It is just a pinch in their data but it signifies that low-mass dark matter clumps are widespread, verifying theories of the Universe’s structure and evolution. The telescopes used include those of VUAS institute “Ventspils International Radio Astronomy Centre” (VIRAC). An international team of astronomers has found a low mass dark object in the distant Universe, not by directly observing any emitted light, but by detecting its tiny gravitational distortion of the light from another distant galaxy. This mysterious object has a mass of about one million times that of our Sun, and its discovery seems consistent with the current best theory about how galaxies like our own Milky Way formed. “Since we can’t see dark matter objects directly, we instead use very distant galaxies as a backlight to look for the gravitational imprints of such objects.” “Hunting for dark objects that don't seem to emit any light is clearly challenging,” said Dr. Devon Powell at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) and lead author of the study published in Nature Astronomy. “Since we can’t see them directly, we instead use very distant galaxies as a backlight to look for their gravitational imprints.” Dark matter is an enigmatic form of matter not expected to emit light, yet it is essential to understanding how the rich tapestry of stars and galaxies we see in the night sky evolved. As a fundamental building block of the universe, a key question for astronomers is whether dark matter is smooth or clumpy, as this could reveal what it is made of. As dark matter cannot be seen, its properties can only be determined by observing the gravitational lensing effect, whereby the light from a more distant object is distorted and deflected by the gravity of the dark object, creating a characteristic arc in the processed image. The team used a network of telescopes from around the world, including the Green Bank Telescope (GBT), the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) and the European Very Long Baseline Interferometric Network (EVN). The latter includes the VIRAC radio astronomical observatory in Irbene. The data from this international network were correlated at the Joint Institute for VLBI ERIC (JIVE) in the Netherlands, forming an Earth-sized super-telescope that could capture the subtle signals of gravitational lensing by the dark object. They discovered that the object has a mass a million times greater than that of our Sun and is located in a distant region of space, approximately 10 billion light years from Earth, when the universe was only 6.5 billion years old. “From the first high-resolution image, we immediately saw a pinch in the gravitational arc, which is the tell-tale sign that we were onto something.” This is the lowest mass object to be found using this technique, by a factor of about 100. To achieve this level of sensitivity, the team had to create a high-fidelity image of the sky using radio telescopes located around the world. Professor John McKean from the University of Groningen (RuG), the University of Pretoria (UP) and the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (SARAO), who led the data collection and is the lead author of a companion paper, said: “ From the first high-resolution image, we immediately saw a pinch in the gravitational arc, which is the tell-tale sign that we were onto something. Only another small clump of mass between us and the distant radio galaxy could cause this.” To analyse the massive dataset, the team had to develop new modelling algorithms that could only be run on supercomputers. “The data are so large and complex that we had to develop new numerical approaches to model them. This was not straightforward as it had never been done before,” said Dr Simona Vegetti at MPA. “We expect every galaxy, including our own Milky Way, to be filled with dark matter clumps, but finding them and convincing the community that they exist requires a great deal of number crunching,” she continued. The team applied a special technique called gravitational imaging, which allowed them to ‘see’ the invisible dark matter clump by mapping its gravitational lensing effect against the radio-luminous arc. “We expect every galaxy, including our own Milky Way, to be filled with dark matter clumps” “Given the sensitivity of our data, we were expecting to find at least one dark object, so our discovery is consistent with the so-called ‘cold dark matter theory’ on which much of our understanding of how galaxies form is based,” said Powell. “Having found one, the question now is whether we can find more and whether the numbers will still agree with the models.” The team are now analysing the data further to better understand what the mysterious dark object could be, but they are also looking into other parts of the sky to see if they can find more examples of such low-mass dark objects using the same technique. If they continue to find such mysterious objects in other parts of the universe, and if they really turn out to be completely devoid of stars, then some theories of dark matter may be ruled out.

Ventspils University of Applied Sciences, in cooperation with Jan Dlugosz University (Poland), will host the international forum “Beyond Words: (Inter)lingual Aspects in Practical Contexts” on October 9 and 10. The forum will bring together representatives from the Ministry of Education and Science, Ventspils City Council, Jan Dlugosz University, the European Commission, and other stakeholders. The event will explore the challenges of translation, multilingualism, and intercultural communication. More information: https://en.venta.lv/colab-beyond-words