Open access (OA) is about achieving free access to research. OA literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Green open access means publishing in a traditional journal and depositing a shareable version of the article in a subject or institutional repository. Most publishers allow the accepted manuscript copy to be shared in a subject or institutional repository like the Research Portal at Queen's.
Gold open access means that the published version of the research article is open access directly from the journal - the reader does not need to pay to read the article.
Open access is important because it enables researchers to share their work internationally and makes research easier to discover online.
“Open Access has proven to be very useful for my publication. A number of people have already contacted me about the paper, our work is reaching many people around the world!” Dr Andriana Margariti, Centre for Experimental Medicine.
"As an early career researcher Open Access has proved invaluable given the reads and citations". Dr Gavin Duffy, School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work.
"I was able to download two chapters authored by colleagues and extremely relevant to my work - this wouldn't have been possible if they had been behind a paywall and not open access". Dr Gosia Swadzba-Kwasny, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering.
"Open Access has enabled my paper to be viewed many more times than papers that appeared at the same time but weren't OA. Open Access has also had a very positive impact on our paper's altmetric score." Dr Aidan Feeney, School of Psychology.
For further information on open access or the Research Portal please email openaccess@qub.ac.uk.
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