Open Access in Biomedical Research

Abstract

In recognition of the importance of open access to the biomedical sciences, the European Medical Research Councils (EMRC) of the European Science Foundation (ESF),launched an activity to investigate what, if any, steps EMRC could usefully take to improve the open access landscape in the biomedical field across Europe. EMRC task force meetings held in September and November 2011 led to the identification of a number of issues and the drafting of a preliminary document. These issues included the coexistence between open access and the traditional business model of scientific publishers (including scientific learned societies), the recognised challenges associated with researchers understanding the concept of open access and depositing their research in local repositories, the recognition of PubMed Central (PMC) as a model of disciplinary repository in the biomedical field, and the desirability and/or feasibility of expanding UK PubMed Central (UKPMC) to include more European biomedical research outputs. The Report closes with a number of reccomendations to advance green and gold Open Access to Biomedicine outputs in a harmonized, sustainable and affordable way.