Read and Publish

Swissuniversities, the umbrella organization of which the University of Bern is a member, has been negotiating with scientific publishers with a view to signing Read and Publish agreements. Agreements of this kind secure continued right of readership for the entire offering of these publishers, while also ensuring that researchers at the participating universities will be able in future to publish their work on an Open Access (OA) basis without incurring any additional costs.
You will find media releases concerning Read and Publish-Agreements here.
Media releases
ACM Open
Publishing with ACM Open
This Read and Publish agreement with ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) covers all journals, magazines and conference proceedings, including pure Open Access titles.
Members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education and the hospitals Insel and Tiefenau can publish their articles in the ACM titles listed here in Open Access at no cost to them:
ACM books are not included in the agreement.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University and the University of Teacher Education Bern as well as the hospitals Insel and Tiefenau: students, doctoral candidates, assistants, lecturers and professors.
ACM uses the mail address to identify eligibility; therefore, we urge you to provide your mail address of the University of Bern, the University of Teacher Education Bern or the Insel or Tiefenau Hospital, respectively.
In order to benefit from the agreement, you must be defined as "Corresponding author" of the article.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the Read and Publish agreement?
Yes, all ACM journals, conference proceedings and magazines are included in the Read and Publish agreement.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
The articles are submitted normally on the ACM website. It is important that you use your e-mail address of the University of Bern, the University of Teacher Education Bern or the Insel- or Tiefenauspital. This will automatically identify you as eligible to participate in ACM Open.
The publisher has provided a PDF file with the exact procedure of the entry steps.
The mail address entered is used to detect the Open Access authorization and the corresponding box in the Author's Journey is automatically checked (Institutionally Paid Open Access); in addition, the cc by license is selected as the Creative Commons license. You have the option to customize these defaults as you wish.
The agreement covers all article types for which ACM charges APC fees, i.e. there are no article types that cannot be published in Open Access.
ATTENTION: If you decline the Open Access option, the article can only be subsequently converted to Open Access for a very short time. After publication, this is no longer possible.
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement, can I publish Open Access in any case?
Yes.
Which OA license can I choose?
In principle, it is possible to select any Creative Commons license.
The CC BY license is recommended and selected by default.
Here you can find more information about Creative Commons licenses.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
No, for the calculation of the entitlement the employment at the time of the acceptance of the article is decisive. Employment at the time the article is submitted is not considered when evaluating whether an article is part of the agreement or not.
I submitted an article to ACM before the agreement started. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
Yes, the submission date does not matter. It is central to the agreement that the article was accepted for publication during the term of the agreement.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Can I have my articles published in all ACM journals free of charge under Open Access?
Yes, this also applies to additional services (color in print, posters), which are also covered by the agreement.
My publication was mistakenly not published in Open Access. How can I have this corrected?
If you provide your institution's email address, ACM will automatically recognize you as eligible for open access publication via ACM Open. If this has not happened, please contact esupport.ub@unibe.ch.
Please make absolutely sure that you always use your e-mail address of the participating institution (University of Bern, University of Teacher Education Bern, Inselspital, Tiefenauspital) and that you are the corresponding author.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article in open access?
Yes, but only during a very short period of time, between the completion of ACM Open and the publication of the article.
Is there an article quota?
There is no article quota.
American Chemical Society (ACS)
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern and PH Bern: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern or PH Bern. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
Is there an article quota?
The number of authorized articles per calendar year is limited and applies throughout Switzerland for all participating institutions. Please note that these are allocated by the publisher on a first-come-first-served basis.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the Read and Publish agreement?
You can see whether your journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement in the title list.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the American Chemical Society (ACS) website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern or PH Bern.
Here is a step-by-step guide to the Open Access publication process and Video-Tutorials on the American Chemical Society (ACS) website.
IMPORTANT: Select the Open Access option.
As soon as your article has been accepted by the journal, the corresponding author will receive a request from American Chemical Society (ACS) to provide various details. Under "Choose your affiliation" you can choose the University of Bern or the PH Bern.
If you have any questions about Read and Publish, please don't hesitate to contact us (esupport.ub@unibe.ch).
Are all article types included in the Read and Publish agreement?
No, there are article types that are not entitled to be published under OA:
- Additions
- corrections
- editorials
Which OA license can I choose?
The CC BY license is mandatory.
You will find more information about Creative Commons licenses here.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
Yes, the employment relationship at the time of submission is decisive. All or part of the research for the article must have been carried out at the University of Bern.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please choose the appropriate affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher, even if you no longer work there.
If you submitted the article before you were employed at the University of Bern, it cannot be published as a publication of the University of Bern, unless the associated research was carried out at the University of Bern.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern.
I submitted an article to American Chemical Society (ACS) in 2022. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
The date of submission is irrelevant. Provided that your article is passed on by American Chemical Society (ACS) to the library for release for open access publication after January 1, 2023, and meets all the requirements of the Agreement, it can be published free of charge.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article Open Access?
Subsequent license changes require a lot of effort. If you have questions or problems, you can contact OAOps@acs.org at American Chemical Society (ACS) directly.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Can I have my articles published in all (Publisher) journals free of charge under Open Access?
The Read and Publish agreement only covers the publication fees.
The university erroneously rejected my publication under OA. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed personally should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply with a statement why your article should still be published under OA.
If the decision to publish under OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Wiley Technical Support to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
AIP
Publishing with AIP Publishing
The read & publish agreement with AIP Publishing relates to most of the publishing house's hybrid journals (hybrid journals are closed access journals, which allow publication of open access articles).
Members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education (Pädagogische Hochschule - PH) and the Hospitals Insel and Tiefenau from the Insel Group can publish on an open access basis in the journals from AIP Publishing listed here without incurring any costs:
The ‘publish’ part of the read & publish agreement covers 28 hybrid open access journals from the scitation platform that is hosted by AIP Publishing. These are journals mainly from AIP and from AIP Member Societies (as AAPT American Association of Physics Teachers or AVS American Vacuum Society) but also from publishing partners such as LIA Laser Institute of America or the CPS Chinese Physical Society.
The publish agreement does not cover any fully (gold) open access journals.
Who can submit articles?
Everybody who at the time of submission is affiliated with the University of Bern, the PH Bern, the Spital Tiefenau or the Inselspital: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors. This also includes visiting researchers but not alumni or retired staff (unless they still have an employment contract, of course).
When submitting your application, please make sure to choose the right affiliation as this is decisive for your acceptance as an eligible author. Please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital, Spital Tiefenau or PH Bern. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the licence agreement?
Check whether the title is included in the following list.
List of journals :
The read & publish agreement only covers hybrid journals.
Financing is not covered by this license if you want to publish in a pure (=gold) open access journal. You can find information on alternative financing options on our open access website.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
As long as your chosen journal is part of AIP Publishing’s title list, you may submit your article on the AIP Publishing website as usual. Make sure to keep the following in mind:
- When starting the submission, please observe that the agreement only allows submissions with the manuscript type “Article” or “Perspective”.
- Section “Author information”: Please make sure to choose the right institution (e.g. Universität Bern) as this is decisive for your acceptance as eligible author. Please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital, Spital Tiefenau or PH Bern.
- Section “Publication Charges and Funding”: Make sure to choose the option “I wish to publish open access as part of an institutional agreement”.
You find further information from AIP Publishing regarding the read & publish agreement on this website. - There you also find their Guide for authors that explains the steps you have to take as part of the read & publish agreement.
You may retroactively choose to convert a closed access article into open access as long as the article qualifies for the agreement and the article cap is not reached yet.
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish license, can I publish Open Access in any case?
No, some article types are not covered for open access publishing under the read & publish deal:
- Your manuscript type must be “Article” or “Perspective”; all other manuscript types are not part of this read & publish agreement.
The following article types are part of the read & publish Agreement:
- Brief Communication
- Communication
- Conference Article
- Fast Track or Article-FT
- Letter
- Note
- Perspective
- Article
- Research Update
- Review
- Roadmap
- Tutorial
Which OA license can I choose?
The articles will be published under the CC BY (Creative Commons Attribute License) license.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
Yes, if you were affiliated with the University of Bern when the article was submitted, the article is eligible for the read & publish agreement.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please choose the appropriate affiliation when you submit the article, even if you know that you will soon be leaving the University of Bern.
The same applies to the PH Bern, the Inselspital and the Spital Tiefenau.
I submitted an article to AIP Publishing in 2021. Can I have it published free of charge in open access?
The date of submission is irrelevant.
Provided that your article is accepted for publication by AIP Publishing after the 1.1.2022, it can be published free of charge.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
Yes and no. You will just receive a pro-forma invoice that shows that the open access publication cost has been paid by the University of Bern.
Do I have to bear any cost for the open access publication under the read & publish agreement?
The licence only covers the publication fees.
If you choose to use additional publication services (color in print, posters), you have to cover the additional costs yourself.
The university erroneously rejected my publication in open access. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed directly should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply with a statement why your article should still be published in open access.
If the decision to publish in open access is corrected after re-examination, your article will be converted retroactively into open access as part of the read & publish agreement.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article in open access?
Yes, if the article cap is not reached yet and if your article meets all requirements of the read & publish agreement, it is possible to convert an article that has been published as closed access into an open access article.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
Is there an article quota?
The number of authorized articles per calendar year is limited and applies throughout Switzerland for all participating institutions. Please note that these are allocated by the publisher on a first-come-first-served basis.
Elsevier
Publishing with Elsevier
This Read and Publish agreement with Elsevier relates to all of the publishing house's journals, including the "golden open access" publications. Members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education (Pädagogische Hochschule - PH) and the Inselspital (University Hospital) can publish on an Open Access basis in the Elsevier journals listed here without incurring any costs.
The publish agreement does not cover journals from Cell Press, Lancet or other society publishing houses.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern, PH Bern and Inselspital: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
The authors must be employed by one of the three participating institutions. A position as a private lecturer at the University of Bern is not sufficient.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the Read and Publish agreement?
Check whether the title is included in the following List of journals.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the Elsevier website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern.
Once the article has been accepted, the corresponding author is sent a link to the “rights and access” form. In this form, choose “Publish Open Access” ("Publishing Options") and your publication costs are covered by the Read and Publish Agreement with UB Bern.
Here is a step-by-step guide to the Open Access publication process on the Elsevier website.
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement, can I publish Open Access in any case?
No, there are article types that are not entitled to be published under OA.
According to the draft agreement, only the following article types will be considered for open access publication:
- Case Report
- Data
- Full-length article
- Microarticle
- Original software publication
- Practice Guidelines
- Protocol
- Review article (journals)
- Replication Studies
- Short communication
- Short survey
- Video Article
Which OA license can I choose?
There are two licenses to choose from: CC BY 4.0 and CC BY-ND 4.0
The CC BY license is recommended.
Here you can find more information about the Creative Common licenses.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
A long period of time may elapse between submission and acceptance. What counts is that the article must have been submitted during membership of the University of Bern and during the life of the agreement with Elsevier (2020-2023). If this is the case, the article will appear under Open Access in the context of the UB Bern license.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please choose the appropriate affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher, even if you no longer work there.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern and the Inselspital.
I submitted an article to Elsevier in 2019. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
No. Only articles submitted as of 2020 are subject to the new conditions.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
The university erroneously rejected my publication under OA. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed personally should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply with a statement why your article should still be published under OA.
If the decision to publish under OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Elsevier Technical Support to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
IEEE
Publishing with IEEE
The Read and Publish agreement with IEEE relates to all of the publishing house's Gold Open Access journals.
Members of the University of Bern and the Bern teacher's training college (Pädagogische Hochschule - PH) can publish on an Open Access basis in the IEEE journals listed here without any costs (excluding any additional fees).
This applies to articles accepted by IEEE from Januar 1, 2022 on.
Green Open Access:
Authors are free to immediately post the accepted version of their articles on their personal or their employers’ websites or on third-party repositories that are operated by not-for-profit organizations.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern and PH Bern: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern or PH Bern.
The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
The authors must be employed by one of the two participating institutions.
A position as a private lecturer is not sufficient.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the licence agreement?
The Read and Publish agreement only covers Gold Open Access journals.
Check whether the journal is included in the linked titlelist.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the IEEE website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern or PH Bern.
Here is a step-by-step guide to the Open Access publication process on the IEEE website.
Attention:
At step 1 of the submission process you have to confirm that you will pay for the publication costs if the article is accepted.
The costs will be covered by the University of Bern if you are a member of the University of Bern at the time of the articles acceptance date.
If you are unsure whether the University of Bern will cover the costs, please contact our support address in advance.
Which OA license can I choose?
There are two licenses to choose from:
- CC BY (Creative Commons Attribute License)
- CC BY-NC-ND (Creative Commons Attribute-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License)
The CC BY license is recommended.
Here you can find more information about the Creative Common licenses.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the University of Bern still cover the publication costs for the article?
You must be employed as a corresponding author at the University of Bern at the time of the acceptance date.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please select the corresponding affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher.
If the article was accepted before or after your employment at the University of Bern, the University of Bern cannot cover the publication costs.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern.
I submitted an article to IEEE in 2021. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
The date of submission is irrelevant.
Provided that your article is accepted by IEEE from January 1, 2022 on, the University of Bern will cover the publications costs.
Is the publication of an article under the Read and Publish license free for me in any case?
The license only covers the publication fees.
If you choose to use additional publication services (color in print, posters), you have to cover any additional costs yourself.
The journal "IEEE Journal of the Electron Devices Society" charges additional costs for more extensive articles.
You have to cover these "Overlength Page Charges" (OPC) yourself.
The university erroneously rejected my publication under OA. How can I have this corrected?
If a publication request is rejected, you will be informed personally with the request to cover the outstanding publication costs yourself.
If you do not agree with the decision, please contact our support address with a statement why the University of Bern should nevertheless cover the publications costs for your article.
Is there an article quota?
The number of authorized artivles per calender year is limited and applies throughout Switzerland for all participating institutions.
Please note that these are allocated by the publisher on a first-come-first-served basis.
IOP
Publishing with IOP Publishing
This Read and Publish agreement with IOP Publishing covers more than 100 journals on the publishing platform IOPscience, including titles from IOP and its publishing partners.
The “publish” part of the agreement relates to the 74 journals included in the package that allow the publication of open access titles (hybrid and fully open access journals)
Members of the University of Bern and the Bern University of Teacher Education (PH Bern) can publish on an Open Access basis in the IOP Publishing journals listed here without incurring any costs:
The Read and Publish agreement does not cover journals from the Electrochemical Society (ECS) or the American Astronomical Society (AAS)
Who can submit articles?
The article must be submitted by the corresponding author who must be affiliated with the University of Bern or PH Bern. This includes students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), staff members and researchers (permanent, temporary or visiting)
When submitting your application, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern or the PH Bern.
According to the agreement, the corresponding author can only be replaced with written approval by IOP Publishing.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under open access. Does this journal come under the Read and Publish agreement?
Check whether the title is included in the following list: Title list.
The agreement covers all hybrid and fully open access journals from IOP and its publishing partners except the Electrochemical Society (ECS) and the American Astronomical Society (AAS)
I would like my article to be published in open access. What do I have to do?
Make sure that the journal is part of the agreement with IOP Publishing (Title list)
Articles can be submitted on the IOP Publishing website as usual:
- Choose the appropriate article type (article types included in the agreement are: paper, special issue paper, review, letter. The exact name of the types may vary between the journals).
- Make sure that your affiliation is clearly stated on the article itself and on the submission form; this information is key for the system to recognize you as being eligible for the agreement with IOP Publishing.
- Use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern.
- PLEASE NOTE: When you are asked for your open access choice, please select “NO” at this stage. This selection only regards open access publications that are financed beyond this agreement (if your publication costs area covered by another funder, you would have to select “YES” here)
- IOP Publishing identifies you as eligible for the agreement and sends you an e-mail informing you about this. You only have to answer the e-mail if you don’t want your article to be published in open access.
- IOP Publishing sends you an open access copyright form to sign.
Once your article is accepted by IOP or its publishing partner, we are asked to confirm that you were affiliated with the University of Bern or the PH Bern at the time of submission and your article will be published in open access at no cost for you.
IOP Publishing provides information about this Read and Publish agreement on its website.
If for some reason your article is not recognized by IOP Publishing to be eligible for this agreement, please contact us (esupportub@unibe.ch). It is possible to have it converted to open access retroactively.
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement, can I definitely publish in open access?
No, there are article types that are not eligible to be published in open access.
According to the draft agreement, only the following article types will be considered for open access publication:
- Paper
- Special Issue Paper
- Review
- Letter
The exact name of the types may vary from journal to journal.
Which open access license can I choose?
The articles will be published with the CC BY 4.0 license.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
Yes, decisive is the employment status at the time of submission.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern or the PH Bern, please indicate the appropriate affiliation in your article and in the form when you submit the article.
I submitted an article to IOP Publishing in 2021. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
Yes, the date of submission is irrelevant.
Provided that your article is passed on by IOP or its publishing partners to the library for release for open access publication after the 1.1.2022, it can be published free of charge.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. The UB Bern takes care of billing.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
The university erroneously rejected my publication in open access. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed directly should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply and explain why your article should still be published in open access.
If the decision to publish in open access is corrected after re-examination, your article will be converted retroactively into open access as part of the Read and Publish agreement.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article in open access?
Yes, it is possible to change the status of the article into open access retroactively if all requirements of the Read and Publish agreement are met. IOP Publishing reserves the right to decline the request when too much time has passed since the publication of the article.
Karger (Inselspital)
Publishing with Karger
This Read and Publish agreement with Karger includes all of the publishing house's journals, including 35 gold open access journals (Except "Kompass" publications).
Members of the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital can publish open access in all Karger journals without incurring any costs.
List of journals:
Find suitable journals for your manuscript with Journal Scout BETA.
Please carefully read the "Author Guidelines" of the selected journal title before submitting your manuscript. Experience has shown that a high number of articles get rejected due to non-compliance with the Author Guidelines.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the teaching and research staff employed at the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the Read and Publish agreement?
This Read and Publish agreement with Karger includes all of the publishing house's journals, including 35 gold open access journals (Except "Kompass" publications).
List of journals :
Find suitable journals for your manuscript with Journal Scout BETA.
Please carefully read the "Author Guidelines" of the selected journal title before submitting your manuscript. Experience has shown that a high number of articles get rejected due to non-compliance with the Author Guidelines.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the Karger website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital.
Here is a step-by-step guide to the Open Access publication process by Karger:
List of authorized journals:
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement, can I publish Open Access in any case?
- Authorized article types: research article, case report, review article, systematic review, methodological article.
- Non-authorized article types: These can be found in the "Author Guidelines" of the respective journal title.
Which OA license can I choose?
There are two licenses to choose from:
- CC-BY-NC for hybrid OA-Journals
- CC-BY for OA-Journals
Here you can find more information about the Creative Common licenses.
I submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital by the time the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital?
The research for the article must have been carried out entirely or for the most part at the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital.
To ensure that you are attributed to the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital, please use the e-mail address of the Inselspital Bern (University Hospital) or Tiefenau-Spital and select the appropriate affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher, even if you no longer work there at that time.
I submitted an article to Karger in 2021. Can I have it published in open access free of charge?
The submission date does not matter. Provided your article has been accepted for publication after January 1, 2022, it can be published free of charge.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Can I have my articles published in all Karger journals free of charge under Open Access?
Yes, the Read and Publish agreement covers the publication fees. There are no additional publication fees.
- authorized article types: research article, case report, review article, systematic review, methodological article.
- non-authorized article types: These can be found in the "Author Guidelines" of the respective journal title.
The university erroneously rejected my publication in OA. How can I have this corrected?
We will inform you directly, if your publication request is rejected.
Please reply promptly and list the reasons why your article should still be published in OA.
If the decision to publish in OA is corrected after another review, you will receive an e-mail from Karger's technical support for further processing. The process will then continue as normal.
If I chose to publish my article in closed access, can I subsequently change my mind and change it to open access?
Subsequent license changes cause an increase in administrative work. . For questions or problem cases, please contact Karger (service@karger.com).
IIf I chose to publish my article in closed access, can I subsequently change my mind and change it to open access?
Subsequent license changes cause an increase in administrative work. . For questions or problem cases, please contact Karger (service@karger.com).
LWW
Publishing with Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW)
This Read and Publish agreement with Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) relates to all of the publishing house's journals, except their "gold open access" publications.
Members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education (PH Bern), the Inselspital (University Hospital) and the Tiefenau-Spital can publish on an open access basis in the LWW-journals listed here without incurring any costs.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education (PH Bern), the Inselspital (University Hospital) and the Tiefenau-Spital: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital, Tiefenau-Spital or PH Bern. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
The authors must be employed by one of the three participating institutions. A position as a private lecturer at the University of Bern is not sufficient.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY in open access. Does this journal fall under the Read and Publish agreement?
Check whether the title is included in the following List of journals.
I would like my article to be published in open access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) website as usual. When submitting your applications, please use your institutional e-mail address (Universität Bern, PH Bern, Inselspitals Bern oder Tiefenau-Spital).
Here is a step-by-step guide to the open access publication process on the Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) website.
IMPORTANT:
When submitting the article, it is mandatory to select the open access option. If you decline the open access option at this stage, you cannot undo it. Subsequent license changes require a lot of effort. If you have questions or problems, you can contact the Journal Production Editor at Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) directly.
Authors who submitted in 2021 can change their Open Access answer (Slide 2) from ‘No’ to ‘Yes’ when they submit a revised article in 2022, prior to acceptance. Authors who submitted a revised article in 2021 which is then accepted in 2022 will need to contact the Journal Editorial Office and request that their response be changed to ‘Yes’ to open access.
If your article is accepted, you will receive an email to continue the workflow on the Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) website. To initialize the "Offer Funding Workflows" you have to select the button "Pay charges now". Please then select the institution to which you belong.
Authors who are not funded, or their funder is not named, to choose None/Other – CC BY NC ND.
If you have any questions about read and publish, please contact us (esupport.ub@unibe.ch).
If my journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement, can I publish open access in any case?
No, there are article types that cannot be published in OA:
- Editorials
- Correspondence
- Abstracts
- Errata
According to the draft agreement, only the following article types will be considered for open access publication:
- Research articles (including case reports)
- Reviews
Which OA license can I choose?
There are two licenses to choose from: CC-BY oder CC-BY-NC-ND.
The CC BY license is recommended.
Here you can find more information about the Creative Common licenses.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication from the University of Bern?
Yes, the employment relationship at the time of submission is decisive. All or part of the research for the article must have been carried out at the University of Bern.
In order to be correctly assigned to the University of Berne, select the corresponding affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher.
If the article was accepted before your employment at the University of Bern, the University of Bern cannot cover the publication costs.
The same applies to researchers at the PH Bern and the Inselspital.
I submitted an article to Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) in 2021. Can I have it published free of charge in OA?
The date of submission is irrelevant. Provided that your article is passed on by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) to the library for release for open access publication after 1. January 2022, it can be published free of charge.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose open access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
The university erroneously rejected my publication in OA. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed personally should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply with a statement why your article should still be published in OA.
If the decision to publish in OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article in open access?
Subsequent license changes require a lot of effort. If you have questions or problems, you can contact the Journal Production Editor at Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (LWW) directly.
Is there an article quota?
The number of authorized articles per calendar year is limited and applies throughout Switzerland for all participating institutions. Please note that these are allocated by the publisher on a first-come-first-served basis.
Nature
Who can submit articles?
The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
This person must be employed or otherwise accredited by one of the participating institutions (University of Bern, Pädagogische Hochschule PH Bern, hospitals Insel and Tiefenau): students, PhD students, assistants, lecturers and professors.
Working at one of the institutions without a campus account/employment contract is not sufficient.
Is there an article quota?
The article quota for 2023 has already been reached.
Therefore, it is no longer possible to fund articles via this Read & Publish agreement until the end of 2023.
As of January 1, 2024, it will again be possible to publish for free in Nature Research journals within the Read & Publish agreement.
For 2024, it is expected that the article quota again will be exhausted by mid-year at the latest.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY in open access. Is this journal covered by the Read and Publish agreement?
You can see whether your journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement in the title list.
This Read and Publish agreement with SpringerNature regards all hybrid Nature Research Journals (= journals that publish both open access and closed access articles). This applies to all titles of the publisher that start with Nature except Nature Protocols, Nature Reviews, and all pure open access journals.
If you would like to publish in a pure open access journal, you can find information on alternative funding options on our Open Access page.
Information about the Read & Publish agreement with SpringerNature outside the Nature titles can be found in this FAQ at Springer.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
- You write an article type that is covered by the Read and Publish agreement (Original Paper, Analysis, Article, Letter, Brief Communication, Registered Report, Resource, Technical Report)
- You are the corresponding author of the article.
- You submit the article to a journal that is part of the Read and Publish agreement (list of eligible journals).
- You use your e-mail address of the University of Bern, the Insel, the Tiefenauspital or the PH Bern in the author journey.
- After the journal has accepted your article, you select in the author journey at Choose your affiliation your institution and if nothing fits correctly "University of Bern". This way SpringerNature automatically recognizes that your "Affiliation" is authorized to publish Open Access.
- Select the Open Access option within the agreement.
If you now decline the Open Access option, you cannot revise your decision. This means that you can no longer fund the Open Access publication via this Read and Publish agreement.
If this Open Access option does not appear in the author journey, either the journal or article type is not part of the Read and Publish agreement or the article quota for the current year has been exhausted.
Are all article types included in the Read and Publish agreement?
No, there are article types that are not part of the Read and Publish agreement.
According to the agreement, only the following article types are considered for Open Access publication:
- Original Paper
- Analysis
- Article
- Letter
- Brief Communication
- Registered Report
- Resource
- Technical Report
Which OA license can I choose?
The CC BY 4.0 license is mandatory.
You will find more information about Creative Commons licenses here.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
Yes, the employment status at the time of submission of the article is crucial. The research for the article must have been carried out in whole or in part at the University of Bern.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please select the appropriate affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher, even if you are no longer working there.
If you are no longer employed at the University of Bern at the time your article is accepted, we will contact you during the article check and ask you for proof that you were employed by us on the submission date.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern and the hospitals Insel and Tiefenau.
I submitted an article to a Nature journal in 2022. Can I have it published as OA free of charge?
The submission date does not matter. As long as the article has been accepted for publication by the Journal after January 1, 2023, and meets all the requirements of the Agreement, it can be published free of charge.
Will I receive an invoice if I select Open Access as the publication form?
No, invoicing is handled by your institution.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article Open Access?
According to SpringerNature this is not possible within this Read and Publish agreement.
If you decide to publish the article Open Access at a later date, you will have to find another source of funding, as this is no longer possible via Springer Compact.
It is not possible to fund open access publication in a hybrid journal through the Open Access Fund of the University of Bern.
The University rejected my OA publication by mistake. How can I have this corrected?
If a publication request is rejected, you will be informed personally.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply as soon as possible with a statement why your article should still be published in OA.
If the decision to publish under OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Springer Technical Support to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
Royal Society of Chemistry
Publishing with RSC
As of 2019, RSC has changed the current consortium agreement to the Read and Publish model. It is recommended to publish in Open Access.
If the Open Access model is selected in a hybrid journal, the author will be automatically informed that the Berne University Library has already paid for this service. There are no further publication costs for the author.
In Full Open Access journals the author pays the publication costs.
Every year, researchers at Bern University can publish a total of 14 articles in hybrid RSC journals in Open Access free of charge.
Which RSC journals are full/hybrid Open Access?
Full Open Access journals:
Chemical Science (Gold OA since 2015, no APC)
RSC Advances (APC = 750 GBP)
Nanoscale Advances (no APC until mid 2021)
RSC Chemical Biology (no APC until mid 2022)
Materials Advances (no APC unti mid 2022)
Environmental Science: Atmospheres has recently been launched, first issue will be published in January 2021 (no APC until June 2023)
Royal Society Open Science (Gold Open Access)
Chemistry Education Research and Practice (CERP) (Free to access)
All other titles are hybrid journals. This means that a paid subscription is required to read the articles that are not published in open access.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern, PH Bern and Inselspital: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern. The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
The authors must be employed by one of the three participating institutions. A position as a private lecturer at the University of Bern is not sufficient.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the RSC website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern.
A personal account on the RSC platform is required.
Link to the RSC registration page.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
A long period of time may elapse between submission and acceptance. What counts is that the article must have been submitted during membership of the University of Bern and during the life of the agreement with RSC (2020-2023). If this is the case, the article will appear under Open Access in the context of the UB Bern license.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Springer
Who can submit articles?
The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
This person must be employed or otherwise accredited by one of the participating institutions (University of Bern, Pädagogische Hochschule PH Bern, hospitals Insel and Tiefenau): students, PhD students, assistants, lecturers and professors.
Working at one of the institutions without a campus account/employment contract is not sufficient.
Is there an article quota?
Yes. According to the consortium's estimates, the annual article quota should cover the publication volume of the participating institutions.
If the article quota is not sufficient in any given year, we will provide timely information on how to proceed by the end of the year.
As long as you can select the Open Access option under the agreement in the course of the "Author Journey" after acceptance for publication, the quota is not exhausted yet.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY in open access. Is this journal covered by the Read and Publish agreement?
You can see whether your journal is part of the Read and Publish agreement in the title list.
The list includes most of the publisher's hybrid journals (= journals that publish both open and closed access articles). Hybrid journals that become open access during the course of the agreement can remain on the list. Therefore, there are also few open access journals on the list. However, most pure open access journals are not covered by this Read and Publish agreement.
Journals published by Nature and Scientific American are explicitly excluded from the Agreement. However, starting 2023 we concluded an additional Read and Publish agreement with SpringerNature for some Nature titles. You find all information on this here at Nature.
If you would like to publish in a pure open access journal, you can find information on alternative funding options on our Open Access page.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
- You write an article type that is covered by the Read and Publish agreement (Original Paper, Review Paper, Brief Communication and Continuing Education).
- You are the corresponding author of the article.
- You submit the article to a journal that is part of the Read and Publish agreement (list of eligible journals).
- You use your e-mail address of the University of Bern, the Insel, the Tiefenauspital or the PH Bern in the author journey.
- After the journal has accepted your article, you select in the author journey at Choose your affiliation your institution and if nothing fits correctly "University of Bern". This way SpringerNature automatically recognizes that your "Affiliation" is authorized to publish Open Access.
- Select the Open Access option within the agreement.
If you now decline the Open Access option, you cannot revise your decision. This means that you can no longer fund the Open Access publication via this Read and Publish agreement.
If this Open Access option does not appear in the author journey, either the journal or article type is not part of the Read and Publish agreement or the article quota for the current year has been exhausted.
Are all article types included in the Read and Publish agreement?
No, there are article types that are not part of the Read and Publish agreement.
According to the agreement, only the following article types are considered for Open Access publication:
- Original Paper (or Original Research, Original Article, Original Paper, Research Paper).
- Review Paper
- Brief Communication
- Continuing Education
Which OA license can I choose?
There are two licenses to choose from: CC BY 4.0 and CC BY-NC 4.0.
We strongly recommend the CC BY license.
You will find more information about Creative Commons licenses here.
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
Yes, the employment status at the time of submission of the article is crucial. The research for the article must have been carried out in whole or in part at the University of Bern.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please select the appropriate affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher, even if you are no longer working there.
If you are no longer employed at the University of Bern at the time your article is accepted, we will contact you during the article check and ask you for proof that you were employed by us on the submission date.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern and the hospitals Insel and Tiefenau.
Will I receive an invoice if I select Open Access as the publication form?
No, invoicing is handled by your institution.
Is the article publication under the Read and Publish agreement in any case free for me?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article Open Access?
According to SpringerNature this is not possible within this Read and Publish agreement.
If you decide to publish the article Open Access at a later date, you will have to find another source of funding, as this is no longer possible via Springer Compact.
NB: NB: It is not possible to fund open access publication in a hybrid journal through the Open Access Fund of the University of Bern.
The University rejected my OA publication by mistake. How can I have this corrected?
If a publication request is rejected, you will be informed personally.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply as soon as possible with a statement why your article should still be published in OA.
If the decision to publish under OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Springer Technical Support to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
Wiley
Publishing with Wiley
The Read and Publish agreement with Wiley relates to all of the publishing house's hybrid journals (i.e. all closed access journals which allow publication of Open Access articles.)
Members of the University of Bern, the Bern University of Teacher Education (Pädagogische Hochschule - PH) and the Inselspital (University Hospital) can publish on an Open Access basis in the Wiley journals listed here without incurring any costs.
Pure open access journals (Fully Gold Open Access) are not part of this license, therefore articles published there cannot be funded through this agreement.
A few journals will be converted to a pure Open Access journal during the term of the agreement. These will remain part of the Agreement until the "Date of Conversion" specified separately by Wiley for each journal. Articles submitted after this date will no longer be eligible for funding through this Agreement. These journals are specifically identified in the title list and can be found on a special page at Wiley.
Information on alternative funding options for publication in Gold Open Access Journals can be found on our Open Access page.
Who can submit articles?
All members of the University of Bern, PH Bern and Inselspital: Students (including postgraduate and doctoral students), assistants, lecturers and professors.
When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern.
The article must be submitted by the corresponding author.
The authors must be employed by one of the three participating institutions at the time the article is accepted (acceptance date).
A position as a private lecturer at the University of Bern is not sufficient.
Is there an article quota?
Yes, the article quota is expected to cover 80-90% of the publication volume.
Therefore, we have to assume that articles accepted for publication at the end of the year can no longer be published in open access under this agreement.
As long as you can select the Open Access option under the agreement in the course of the "Author Journey" after acceptance for publication, the quota is not exhausted yet.
I would like to publish an article in Journal XY under Open Access. Does this journal come under the license agreement?
The Read and Publish agreement only covers hybrid journals.
Check whether the journal is included in the title list.
Pure open access journals (Fully Gold Open Access) are not part of this license, therefore articles published there cannot be funded through this agreement.
A few journals will be converted to a pure Open Access journal during the term of the agreement. These will remain part of the Agreement until the "Date of Conversion" specified separately by Wiley for each journal. Articles submitted after this date will no longer be eligible for funding through this Agreement. These journals are specifically identified in the title list and can be found on a special page at Wiley.
Information on alternative funding options for publication in Gold Open Access Journals can be found on our Open Access page.
I would like my article to be published under Open Access. What do I have to do?
Articles are submitted on the wiley website in the usual way. When submitting your applications, please use your e-mail address at the University of Bern, Inselspital or PH Bern.
Here is a step-by-step guide to the Open Access publication process on the Wiley website.
If the Open Access option does not appear, either the journal or the article type is not part of the license.
- List of authorized journals
- Authorized article types: Original Articles, Review Articles, Case Report, Clinical Message, Commentary, Consensus, Drug Focus, History, Meta Analysis, Rapid Publication, Technical Note und Tutorial
Attention: If you reject the Open Access option, you cannot undo this. The Open Access publication can no longer be financed by this license.
You can find information on alternative financing options on our Open Access page.Which OA license can I choose?
There are three licenses to choose from:
- CC BY (Creative Commons Attribute License)
- CC BY-NC (Creative Commons Attribute-NonCommercial License)
- CC BY-NC-ND (Creative Commons Attribute-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License)
The CC BY license is recommended.
Here you can find more information about the Creative Common licenses.
Are all article types included in the Read and Publish agreement?
No, there are article types that are not entitled to be published under OA.
According to the agreement, the following article types, among others, will be considered for open access publication:
- Original Articles
- Review Articles
- Case Report
- Clinical Message
- Commentary
- Consensus
- Drug Focus
- History
- Meta Analysis
- Rapid Publication
- Short Communication
- Technical Note
- Tutorial
I have submitted an article but will no longer be a member of the University of Bern once the review process is complete. Will the article still appear as a publication of the University of Bern despite this?
All or most part of the research for the article must have bee carried out at the University of Bern.
In addition, you must be employed as a corresponding author at the University of Bern at the time of the acceptance date.
In order to be assigned to the University of Bern, please select the corresponding affiliation after the article has been accepted by the publisher.
If the article was accepted before or after your employment at the University of Bern, the University of Bern cannot cover the publication costs.
The same applies accordingly to the PH Bern and the Inselspital.
I submitted an article to Wiley in 2020. Can I have it published free of charge under OA?
The date of submission is irrelevant.
Provided that your article is accepted by Wiley from May 1, 2021 on, it can be published free of charge.
Do I receive an invoice if I choose Open Access as the form of publication?
No. Billing takes place through UB Bern.
Is the publication of an article under the Read and Publish license free for me in any case?
The agreement covers only the Article Processing Charges (APC) for the open access publication of your article.
All other publication costs (e.g. color in print, posters, publication fees for overlength of an article) cannot be charged via the Read and Publish agreement.
Can I subsequently change my mind and publish my article Open Access?
According to Wiley this is not possible within this Read & Publish license.
If you decide to publish the article Open Access only at a later point, you will have to look for another source of funding. You can find information on this on our Open Access page.
The university erroneously rejected my publication under OA. How can I have this corrected?
You will be informed personally should your publication request be rejected.
If you think this is a mistake, please reply with a statement why your article should still be published under OA.
If the decision to publish under OA is corrected after re-examination, you will receive a request from Wiley Technical Support to complete the submission form again. This allows the process to continue as normal.
If you have any questions about Read & Publish, please don't hesitate to contact us at esupport.ub@unibe.ch.