Comments on Public Notice NOT-OD-04-064 Issued by the National Institutes of Health
on Enhanced Public Access to NIH Research Information
By
The American Society for Cell Biology
The American Society for Cell Biology is a nonprofit scientific society of over 11,000
members in every state of the U.S. and in 50 countries. Its major activities include
publishing, advocacy for sound science policy, hosting influential meetings in cell
biology, and programs to support the careers of women and underrepresented minorities
in basic biomedical research.
The ASCB commends the National Institutes of Health for its proposal to develop a
comprehensive archive of NIH-funded research by requesting that publications that result
from that research be deposited in electronic format in PubMed Central for public access
six months following acceptance for publication. The ASCB endorses the proposal with
enthusiasm and without qualification.
It is the position of the Society that taxpayers have the right to reasonable access of the
products of their support. “Reasonable” might be defined as the greatest possible access
that preserves the economic incentive of scientific publishers to disseminate the results of
research. The ASCB recognizes that those costs, which can include peer review, editing,
and redaction, can be significant. However, the Society’s experience demonstrates that a
journal’s ability to remain profitable is not necessarily compromised by the
implementation of a reasonable release policy.
The ASCB was the first publisher to participate in the NIH’s PubMed Central by
releasing its high-impact monthly research journal, Molecular Biology of the Cell, for
free public access two months after publication. The Society is confident in its claim that
the proposed NIH policy will not adversely affect the subscription income of otherwise
successful journals based on its own experience with MBC. In fact implementation of this
aggressive release schedule for MBC coincided with an increas