New NIH Publication Law

As of April 7, 2008, the NIH requires that all journal articles also be submitted to the digital archive PubMed Central. Upon acceptance for publication, all articles that emerge in whole or in part from NIH funding must be submitted to PubMed Central by April 7, 2008 if:

• Supported from direct costs on an NIH grant or cooperative agreement active on October 1, 2007 and beyond.
• Supported by direct costs on a contract signed after April 7, 2008.
• Directly funded by an NIH Intramural Program or if NIH pays your salary.

What Do I Need to Do?

• As of May 25, 2008, NIH applications, proposals and progress reports must include the PubMed Central reference number when citing and article that is covered by the policy.
• The Principal Investigator and the Institution are responsible for ensuring that all articles authored or co-authored by the investigator or arose from the award, are submitted to PubMed Central. Even if the PI is not an author on the article, they are responsible for ensuring compliance with this condition of award.
• All peer-reviewed journal articles, research reports and reviews are covered by the policy.
• The article must be made available to the public no later than 12 months of journal publication.

How Do I Comply?

• If you submit articles to one of the journals listed at http://publicaccess.nih.gov/submit_process_journals.htm, no further action is needed on your part. However, UW recommends that you confirm that the article has been submitted by the journal.
• If you are NOT submitting to one of these journals, you will need to submit or ensure that others have submitted to PubMed Central.
  • Inform the journal that the article is subject to the Public Access Policy (A template letter is available).
  • Ensure that any copyright or other agreement allows the article to be submitted to NIH.
  • Go on-line to http://www.nihms.nih.gov or http://www.nihms.nih.gov/web-help/index.html for instructions.

Additional Guidance and Resources

• PI's should be aware that they are responsible for ensuring compliance for multi-investigator, multi-site and multi-institutional research, training and instructional grants and contracts.
• Authors should be careful to communicate with publishers on issues of copyright and transfers of rights to ensure that they can meet the conditions of the Public Access Policy.
• Any copyright agreement should reserve rights to comply with the NIH policies and conditions and reserve use rights for internal research and education purposes.
• Read the NIH guidelines and FAQ's at http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/ many times!