Vilnius Hosted Its First EURAMET EPM Committee Meeting – FTMC Project Among the Selected

On 18–19 November, FTMC hosted a meeting of the European Partnership on Metrology (EPM) Committee – the first ever held in Lithuania and the ninth overall. This field is coordinated by EURAMET, the association uniting Europe’s national metrology institutes. Lithuania is represented in it by the National Metrology Institute (NMI), whose functions are carried out by FTMC.

Metrology is the science of measurement. Specialists in this field ensure that measurements are accurate and consistent everywhere in the world. Metrology therefore covers measurements of length, weight, time, temperature, electricity and much more – all of which are essential in trade, industry, science, medicine and many other areas where precision and reliability matter.

“EURAMET is a huge and powerful regional metrology organization. Part of its role is to ensure that Europe’s best measurement capabilities are recognized worldwide. The second task is to manage partnerships on metrology with research funding, to prepare for the future and to answer the needs of industry and society. That is the reason we have gathered in Lithuania this time,” said Maguelonne Chambon, Chair of the EURAMET EPM Committee, during her visit to Vilnius.

Among the Winners – an FTMC Project

The EPM Committee meets twice a year: at the start of summer it approves a list of metrology-related projects. This is followed by the second stage, during which project proposals on the list are merged into consortia that submit Joint Research Projects (JRP) by the end of September. At the autumn meeting (this time held at FTMC), the EPM Committee approves the final selection of JRPs and handles other matters.

“Many EPM Committee members visited FTMC for the first time, so they were able to see what Lithuania’s NMI looks like in practice. They were interested in how many employees FTMC has and what research is carried out here. All guests were highly impressed by the new FTMC building and the working conditions it offers. This is also an important factor for strengthening inter-institutional cooperation in the future,” notes Dr Arūnas Gudelis, Head of the NMI Ionizing Radiation Metrology Laboratory.

(Dr Arūnas Gudelis. Photo: FTMC)

During the meeting it was revealed that out of three JRPs involving FTMC researchers, one project was selected for funding. This is the “Health” call project JRP-h13 “Standardisation of targeted and untargeted metabolomic quantitative methods for their future use in routine clinical diagnostics” (Met4Metab). One of the contributors is Dr Darius Valiulis of the FTMC Department of Environmental Research.

Metabolomics is a relatively new scientific field which studies changes in metabolites – products of metabolism – in cells, tissues and organisms.

It was also announced that the project submitted under the “Regulation” call JRP-n04 “Metrology support for particulate matter metrics in the revised EU Air Quality Directive” (AIRQMET), involving colleagues from the Lithuanian Energy Institute (LEI), has likewise been included in the list of selected projects.

The final list of winners will be approved on 7 January 2026, following an ethics review of the projects.

(Maguelonne Chambon. Photo: FTMC)

In Five Years – a Unified European System

“We always aim to select the best projects, which can really answer the needs of our industry and support the competitiveness of the European Union – and not only the EU, but all European industry,” says Maguelonne Chambon, Chair of the EURAMET EPM Committee. “Today we are facing major challenges, such as artificial intelligence, quantum technology and other emerging areas like advanced manufacturing, nano- and microelectronics, photonics, and biotechnology.”

The expert adds that EURAMET allocates around €800 million to this entire research programme – €300 million from the European Commission and €450 million from the EURAMET Member States.

One of the association’s key goals is to create, by 2030, a world-class, sustainable and well-coordinated metrology system in Europe.

“Metrology costs a lot, it requires high-end technologies. So, we need to combine our efforts and put our energy together to have the best results. To deliver that, we really need to create an infrastructure to coordinate better between us, because one national metrology institute cannot deliver everything that industry or society needs.

It takes time, but if we look at where we were 20 years ago, we have progressed a lot. Before, we were just trying to make some projects together. Now we are really building the projects together. This makes a big difference,“ says Chambon.

Info: FTMC