Open Access Publishing: Home

• Gold OA refers to research published in a fully open access journal that is made available, immediately upon publication, directly on the journal or publisher website. Gold OA requires of the author or funder a payment known as an article processing charge (APC). APCs are typically between $1,000 and $5,000.
• Green OA, often called "self-archiving," refers to research publications that are made available on an institutional repository, such as CaltechAUTHORS. A license agreement with a traditional publisher should include what version of the work (e.g. preprint, postprint, etc.) can be self-archived, and may also require an embargo period after traditional publication before the work can be uploaded. Green OA does not require an APC.
• Hybrid OA refers to research made available in a journal that publishes a mixture of open access and closed access articles. Hybrid OA journals largely follow a traditional subscription model, and make freely available to non-subscribers only individual articles whose authors have paid APCs.
• Diamond OA is a relatively new term referring to research that is made available at no cost to either the reader or the author. The operating and publication costs of diamond OA journals are usually covered by the organization sponsoring the journal, often an academic institution.
• Bronze OA refers to research that has been made temporarily free by a publisher on its website, as a marketing initiative or for public benefit. For example, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, many publishers removed paywalls for research literature related to the virus.

Transformative agreements are contracts between libraries and publishers that seeks to shift away from subscription-based reading and toward open access publishing. These often take the form of a bundled payment for all reading and publishing with a publisher whose portfolio includes both paywalled and open access materials. Such contracts are often referred to as read-and-publish agreements. Learn more about transformative agreements here.

The Caltech Library has transformative agreements with a number of publishers to support open access publishing and relieve individual authors of APCs. See the full list of the library's agreements here.

Subscribe to Open is a model in which a smaller number of libraries contribute to make a publisher's portfolio freely available to everyone else. If a sufficient number of libraries subscribe, the content is made freely available. If not, only subscribing libraries retain access. The Caltech Library contributes to a number of subscribe to open programs.

The Directory of Open Access Journals is a user-friendly, searchable directory of over 13,000 open access journals in all disciplines. Records include general information on the journal's publisher and subject coverage, as well as information on APCs and copyright and licensing policies.

The Directory of Open Access Books is a "community-driven discovery service that indexes and provides access to scholarly, peer-reviewed open access books and helps users to find trusted open access book publishers."

Unpaywall is a handy browser extension that searches government and university repositories for legal free versions of research articles, and lets you redirect to that free version if you're on a journal page with a paywalled article.

At the start of 2014, Caltech implemented an open access policy to help disseminate the results of research conducted at the institute. Read more about the Caltech Open Access Policy here.

• Broader visibility and impact, more citations 

  The "open access citation advantage" has been widely investigated over recent decades. For example, a 2018 study found that, accounting for age and discipline, open access articles receive 18% more citations than average. A 2021 systematic review found a majority of sampled OACA studies to confirm the existence of a citation advantage for open access publications, under at least some circumstances.

• Expression of authors’ rights

  You own the full copyrights to that article. If you publish in an open access journals, you retain full copyrights. However, if you choose to publish in a traditional subscription access journal, you will be required to sign a form transferring some or all of your copyrights over to the publisher. SPARC provides an excellent summary on your rights as an author.

• Grant compliance

  Many funders are requiring the journal article, as well as supporting data, to be made openly available. By choosing an open access model, you are complying with the mandate. This is especially true for many federally funded grants, such as the National Science Foundation. For a listing of how federal funders are complying and their plans, visit the Public Access Plans & Guidance page.

• Public engagement

  In 2023, the White House Office of Science and Technology (OSTP) declared 2023 the "Year of Open Science." Throughout 2023, federal agencies engaged with a wide range of communities--from students, researchers to private companies and libraries--in strengthening their commitment to open science by drafting their Public Access Plans & Guidance.

• Participation in evolving research culture

  Open access has opened the doors to scholarly research output by helping to reach underserved communities and populations. Open access can lead to better research, better science, better policies, better healthcare, and much more.

• Promotion and tenure impacts

  • There are plenty of high-impact OA journals.
  • Many publishers apply the same standards and procedures for both OA and non-OA titles. This incluseds editorial proceesses, peer review, and more.

• Quality of Open Access

  • Is the journal legitiimate? Are OA journals are not peer reviewed? The truth is that the majority of OA journals follow the same editorial and peer review process as non OA journals.

• Cost to publish OA

  • Don't all journlas charge author fees or article processing fees (APC's) to publish OA? While some higher-impact journals do charge APC's, the benefits of making your research openly available may outweigh the costs of the fees.
  • Many organizations offer discounted programs to publish OA, and some may even waive the APC fee entirely.
  • You can also look at Diamond OA models, which are journals that do not charge any fees for publishing your articles.

• My journal does not provide me with an Open Access option.

  • Many publishers will allow authors to share a version of their work, mostly either a pre-print or a post-print (before final copy-editing review) on their personal website, or an instituional repository, such as CaltechAUTHORS.