The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has published its "Enhanced Public Access Policy" with respect to scientific publications resulting from research supported in part or fully by NIH funds (http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-08-033.html). The rule requires that, as of 7 April 2008, all electronic versions of final, peer reviewed papers funded by the NIH must be deposited to the National Library of Medicine's PubMed Central (PMC) upon acceptance. This must be made publicly available no later than 12 months after the official date of publication.
The following information is being provided to The
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition and The Journal
of Nutrition authors and American Society for Nutrition (ASN)
members to clarify key points of the NIH policy and to provide
information on ASN policy with respect to the deposition of
accepted manuscripts in PMC.
- Authors are required to deposit the version of the article that has been accepted for publication and includes changes resulting from peer review. ASN is now making these deposits to PMC on behalf of authors. Authors must designate their paper as an NIH-funded paper in the manuscript submission system at the time of first submission, and will be invoiced for the deposit fee at the time of publication. Deposit fees are $20 for ASN members, and $45 for non-members.
- The NIH has indicated it will honor all copyright agreements authors have signed with publishers.
- Copyright for articles published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition and The Journal of Nutrition will remain with the American Society for Nutrition.
- The American Society for Nutrition supports efforts to increase access to scholarly publications. All journal content is made publicly accessible, without subscription, on The Journal of Nutrition and The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition websites 12 months after publication. As noted above, ASN policy and journal manuscript submission/ copyright release forms have been modified to allow public release of NIH-funded accepted manuscripts on PubMed Central 12 months after publication. This embargo period, which is consistent with ASN policy and the NIH guidelines, is necessary to safeguard subscription revenue, an essential component of journal operating budgets.
The full text of the NIH Policy on Enhancing Public Access to Archived Publications Resulting from NIH-Funded Research is available at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-05-022.html. Additional details will be available at http://nihms.nih.gov/. If you have questions about the ASN response to the NIH policy, please feel free to contact ASN at journal@nutrition.org.