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Open access and rights retention

Finding your funder's requirements

Many research funders have policies in place to ensure that the results of the research they fund are openly available. All research outputs arising from externally funded research at the University must abide by their funders’ policies. It is therefore important that you are familiar with the terms and conditions of your research grant or contract.

The majority of research funders’ open access policies are available via the JISC Open Policy service. You should also refer back to the terms and conditions of your grant or contract and to any other project-specific agreements, such as collaboration agreements with project partners.

NIHR

The NIHR Open Access policy for publications submitted on or after 1 June 2022 applies to all peer-reviewed research articles, including reviews not commissioned by publishers and conference papers, submitted for publication on or after 1 June 2022.

Monographs (with the exception of NIHR Journals Library publications), book chapters,  edited collections, or forms of non-peer-reviewed material, such as pre-prints are NOT in scope.
 
 

What is required

 

How to ensure your article meets the requirements

1. Follow the SHU checklist to make your scholarly articles open access with a CC BY licence

Please make sure that you include the Rights Retention Statement in your submission.

2. Deposit your paper to PubMed Central (PMC) and Europe PMC by the official final publication date.

The publisher of your chosen journal may automatically deposit papers to PubMed Central / Europe Pubmed Central on publication.  Check the information about the journal on the journal's website to find out if this is the case. This may only be the case for papers published Gold Open Access.

If a publisher does not automatically deposit papers, it is possible to self-archive copies of your papers using Europe PMC Plus. This option is only available for eligible research. Please see the Europe PMC Plus user guide.

If an article processing charge (APC), has been funded by the NIHR, a condition of the funding is that the publisher has an agreement with the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to deposit the Version of Record in PMC and allow that content to be shared with Europe PMC at the time of publication.

NIHR compliance checklist

  • Is the article in-scope of the NIHR open access policy?
  • Will the article be made immediately and freely available on Europe PMC and PubMed Central from publication date?
  • Will the article be assigned the correct licence (CC BY, OGL, or CC BY-ND by exception)?
  • Has the NIHR’s licensing requirement statement (or the SHU rights retention statement) been included within the acknowledgement section of the manuscript and any cover letter/note accompanying the submission?
  • Does the article include a data sharing statement? Read more about the NIHR position on the sharing of research data.
  • Does the article contain appropriate acknowledgement of NIHR funding? Read more on how to acknowledge the NIHR in research outputs.

This is based on the NIHR checklist which also provides further detail.

UKRI

The new UKRI Open Access Policy affects researchers who are publishing work that acknowledges funding from one of the seven UK Research Councils (AHRC, BBSRC, ESRC, EPSRC, MRC, NERC, STFC) or Innovate UK.

 

What is required

  • open access on publication under the CC BY licence (or, exceptionally, CC BY-ND subject to request and approval) for articles and conference papers submitted on or after 1 April 2022, and accepted for final publication in either a journal, conference proceeding with an International Standards Serial Number (ISSN), or publishing platform. 
  • open access no later than 12 months after publication for monographs, book chapters and edited collections resulting from a grant from one of the UK Research Councils, published on or after 1 January 2024. The open access version must have a Creative Commons attribution (CC BY) licence or other licence permitted by UKRI.

Check the UKRI Open Access Policy to see if your work is in scope and for more details of the requirements.

 

How to ensure your article meets the requirements:

1. Follow the SHU checklist to make your scholarly articles open access with a CC BY licence

Make sure that you include the Rights Retention Statement in your submission. 

2. Deposit in Europe PMC if applicable

If your article or paper is MRC- or BBSRC-funded it must also be deposited in Europe PMC. This is in accordance with the MRC’s additional terms and conditions and the BBSRC’s safeguarding good research policy.

The publisher of your chosen journal may automatically deposit papers to Europe PMC on publication.  Check the information about the journal on the journal's website to find out if this is the case.

If a publisher does not automatically deposit papers, it is possible to self-archive copies of your papers using Europe PMC Plus. This option is only available for eligible research.   Please see the Europe PMC Plus user guide.

3.Include a Data Access Statement in your paper

The UKRI expect you to include a Data Access Statement in your paper, even if you have not collected or produced any new primary research data (see page 10 of the UKRI Open Access Policy).

 

How to ensure your longform publication meets the requirements

UKRI have provided guidance on making your monograph, book chapter or edited collection Open Access.   

The Library will be able to apply on your behalf for support from the dedicated fund UKRI provide. There are limits on the costs and the output will need to be verified as eligible. 

For help with making you publication Open Access please email: library-research-support@shu.ac.uk 

You may also find it helpful to look at the UKRI guidance on managing copyright under the UKRI Open Access policy. 

Wellcome

Published outputs that arise from Wellcome funding must be open and accessible to everyone.  There is a new Open Access policy from 1 January 2025.

Publications that report original research, which has been supported in whole, or in part, by Wellcome must be made freely available on Europe PubMed Central on publication under a Creative Commons attribution licence (CC BY) or by exception and approved by Wellcome before submission a CC BY-ND licence. Publications must also include a data availability statement.

The Wellcome Open Access Policy provides further details.

Wellcome also provide a page with detailed practical guidance on complying with the Wellcome open access policy.

Help with your funder requirements

For help with identifying if a journal is compliant with your funder requirements, please contact the Library Research Support Team:


Email: library-research-support@shu.ac.uk
Call: (0114) 225 3852