Open Access Week: CUP moves four journals to gold OA

Cambridge University Press is moving four more of its journals from a traditional subscription model to gold open access in  what it describes as 'a further demonstration of its commitment to the development of a sustainable, more open future for academic publishing'.

The announcement coincides with the start of Open Access Week (22 to 28 October), which aims to promote the benefits of open access and help to make it a new norm in scholarship and research.

From 1 January 2019, the following journals will move to gold open access:

• Epidemiology & Infection;
• Genetics Research;
• Primary Health Care Research and Development; and
• Netherlands Journal of Geosciences

To mark Open Access Week, this year’s most downloaded articles from each of the journals will be made freely available until the end of October; and the Press says plans are in place to flip a larger number of journals to open access in 2020.

Fiona Hutton, open access publisher for STM journals, said: ‘Flipping these titles to open access will increase both the visibility and the impact of the high-quality research they contain. This in turn, will strengthen their position as highly influential publications in their respective fields. These are fields that are embracing OA and flipping will help the journals to better serve their communities.’

The Press says its mission to make open research work for the academic communities it serves, also lies behind its new content sharing service, Cambridge Core Share. This allows journal content to be shared quickly, easily and responsibly, with authors and readers able to generate a link to an article that can then be shared anywhere online, allowing anyone to read the final, published version for free.

There are now more than 270 journals benefiting from Cambridge Core Share, which went live in September following a ten-month pilot. Since then, more than 2,700 share links have been generated – a rise of 286 per cent on the previous monthly average.

Mandy Hill, managing director of academic publishing, added: ‘As an advocate for the benefits of open research, we are keen to support rapid dissemination and collaboration for researchers. We will continue to invest in innovative solutions and explore models that will ensure sustainability and quality for the academic community.’