Ventspils University of Applied Sciences Engineering Research Institute Ventspils International Radio Astronomy Centre (VUAS ERI VIRAC) in collaboration with University of Latvia Institute of Astronomy (UL IA) developed  the Latvian Council of Science grant project "Complex Investigations of the small bodies in the Solar system" has been highly valued and financially approved.       

This is the first step of the two leading Latvian astronomical institutes in the field of planetary scientific research. The project envisages several activities related to observations of small bodies in the Solar system (especially - asteroids and comets) using three unique astronomic instruments in the Baltics - UL IA optical Baldone Schmidt telescope and VUAS VIRAC radio telescopes RT32 and RT16 in Irbene.     

The project envisages four research directions:         

1. Monitoring of asteroids, comets and Near Earth Objects (NEO) using the Schmidt Optical Range Telescope in Baldone;      ;
   
2. Asteroid and comet photometry research;
   
3. Simultaneous execution of the observations of the hydrogen maser emitted by the comet (using radio telescopes in Irbene) with the observations of the brightness of the comet (using the Schmidt telescope in Baldone);     
   
4. processing and interpretation of observational data