HHMI- Immediate Access to Research Policy

Open science practices
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According to the new HHMI’s policy document, effective for articles submitted to preprint servers or journals on or after January 1, 2026 (https://hhmicdn.blob.core.windows.net/policies/Immediate-Access-to-Research.pdf), the HHMI increases the incentive to their grantees to publish preprints in order to make their research quickly available.

The paragraph “Use of HHMI Budget for Fees” mentions that:

“Beginning January 1, 2026, HHMI budgets can no longer be used to pay article processing charges at hybrid journals (…). HHMI budgets can continue to pay APCs at fully open access journals until further notice. In the coming 1-2 years, HHMI will seek to replace APC payments from HHMI lab budgets with centralized support of publisher service fees, including transparent peer review services for preprints.”

What the policy does not mention, however, is any specific incentive for HHMI grantees to publish in DOA journals, which represent a more equitable and sustainable publishing model. This could present an opportunity to engage with HHMI policy makers to raise awareness about the importance of DOA in this context. Are there any plans to include this topic in the EDCH agenda? (@johanrooryck @PierreMounier @Irakleitos)

In addition, the policy’s definition of a “fully open access journal” may cause confusion. It is described as “a journal in which all articles are made freely and permanently available online immediately upon publication, without any paywall barriers”. While this aligns with the definition of a diamond open access journal, the policy also states that HHMI budgets can continue to cover APCs at fully open access journals, though true diamond open access journals do not charge APCs. This might be another valuable opportunity to clarify and promote an accurate definition of DOA in discussions with policy makers.

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I do not think HHMI wishes to privilege Diamond OA journals. Their idea is rather to further fragment services that can be paid for: a fee for hosting the preprint, a fee for reviewing etc. As usual when you fragment a service into smaller subservices, the total fee increases. HHMI is a strong believer in (a) post-publication peer review (the eLife model that they were among the first to support) and (b) the fact that services for pos-publication peer review can be split up. I do not think the publishers will follow that route, as splitting services into smaller payments/ invoices is quite costly.

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Many thanks for your reply, @johanrooryck ! It is quite unfortunate that HHMI does not wish to privilege DOA. I do agree with you that splitting services might increase the total fee and thus publishers might not want to go that route. As a funding agency, though, it would be great if they could incentivize their grantees to use the resources for actual research, not necessarily for paying APCs…