Federal Public Access Policies Home

This guide provides basic information about the public access policy for federally funded research outputs and how the UAB Libraries can help with compliance. The policy pertains to both manuscripts and the underlying data:

• Manuscripts: Author Accepted Manuscript must be digitally archived in a location specified by the funder (for example PubMed Central for NIH; NSF-PAR for the NSF) upon its acceptance for publication for public availability without embargo upon the Official Date of Publication.
• Data: Data underlying publications should be shared according to the approved data management plan without embargo on or before the publication date.

This policy goes into effect on December 31, 2025 for most agencies. There are notable exceptions including the NIH public access policy which activates on July 1, 2025 at which time it will replace the 2008 Public Access Policy.

Failure to comply with the public access policy could result in loss of funding. Be proactive to maintain your funding! 

• Develop your compliance plan while you are preparing your manuscript.
• How you comply and report compliance depends on the journal you choose and the funding source of the project

Historically, scientific findings were published in journals inaccessible to the general public especially in the months or years immediatly following publication (called an embargo). The U.S. federal government has instituted increased public access to taxpayer funded research without delay. For example, the NIH has required the sharing of journal articles based on NIH funded research since 2008. In 2013, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) released a memo coloquially referred to as the "Holdren Memo" which mandated that all federally funded research be made publicly accessible after an embargo period of one year. In 2022, the OSTP released another memo (aka the "Nelson Memo") which updated the policy to include data underlying the publications and reduced the embargo period to zero - meaning public access must be granted on the date of publication. See the timeline and paper below for more information on the changes to open science policies in the US.

Data underlying federally funded publications must be shared in accordance with an approved Data Management and Sharing Plan. The policy recommends data be shared as publicly as possible while being as secure as necessary. See the Data Management guide for more information on data sharing practices.