National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy
What Is the NIH Public Access Policy?
The NIH Public Access Policy requires researchers with NIH funding to submit final peer-reviewed manuscripts resulting from those funds to PubMed Central, a free digital archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature.
Who Does It Affect?
You must submit published materials resulting from NIH funding if your work fits in one of the following four categories:
- Directly funded by an NIH grant or cooperative agreement active in Fiscal Year 2008 (October 1, 2007- September 30, 2008) or beyond;
- Directly funded by a contract signed on or after April 7, 2008;
- Directly funded by the NIH Intramural Program.
- If NIH pays your salary.
AND if your research is accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal on or after April 7, 2008.
See the NIH website for more information.
What Do I Need To Do?
If you are affected by the NIH Public Access Policy, you must:
Retain rights to deposit in PubMed Central
- Notify your publisher that your research is subject to the NIH Public Access Policy and that you must deposit a final peer-reviewed manuscript in PubMed Central.
Georgia Tech Library recommends using the following Sample Cover Letter, based on the ARL/SPARC/Science Commons white paper titled, "COMPLYING WITH THE NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH PUBLIC ACCESS POLICY: Copyright considerations and options," by Michael W. Carroll. - Make sure any copyright agreement you sign allows you to submit your work to an open access repository such as PubMed Central.
NIH recommends the following language be added to any copyright agreement that you sign:
"Journal acknowledges that Author retains the right to provide a copy of the final manuscript to the NIH upon acceptance for Journal publication, for public archiving in PubMed Central as soon as possible but no later than 12 months after publication by Journal."
See the NIH website for more information.
OR
Sign and submit the Science Commons/Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) Access-Reuse author addendum. Visit the Scholar's Copyright Addendum Engine website, where you can create a PDF of the addendum. Sign and date the addendum and attach it to your publisher's copyright agreement.
Deposit in PubMed Central
- Some journals will submit manuscripts to PubMed Central on your behalf. See a list of these journals.
- Submit manuscripts yourself to PubMed Central, or designate someone to submit on your behalf. See a list of tutorials for help submitting to the NIHMS system.
- Library staff will submit manuscripts to PubMed Central on your behalf (and deposit in SMARTech, depending on the rights reserved). For assistance, please email:
Include your PMCIDs in citations in NIH applications, proposals, and progress reports
- "As of May 25, 2008, NIH applications, proposals, and progress reports must include the PubMed Central reference number when citing a paper that falls under the policy and is authored or co-authored by the investigator, or arose from the investigator's NIH award. This policy includes applications submitted to the NIH for the May 25, 2008 due date and subsequent due dates."
See the NIH website for more information.
What kind of services does the library offer faculty affected by the policy?
- We answer questions related to the NIH Public Access Policy and how to comply.
- We offer NIH Public Access Policy informational sessions to departments, research groups, and individual faculty
(July 11, 2008 OOD Brown Bag, "Complying with the NIH Public Access Policy: Depositing in PubMed Central"). - We deposit manuscripts in PubMed Central and SMARTech on behalf of authors.
- We provide hands-on PubMed Central submission training.
- We suggest tools that help researchers retain rights to deposit in repositories like PubMed Central.
For assistance with any of the above, please email:
Frequently Asked Questions about the NIH Public Access Policy
GT Library NIH Public Access Information Sheet
Journals That Submit Articles to PubMed Central