The Wellcome Trust has a strong commitment to making the published outputs of research it has funded open access (OA). They updated their open access policy to align with Plan S principles from January 1st 2021. This page explains how to meet Wellcome OA requirements..
Original research and review articles
The core principle of Plan S is that from 2021, all scholarly publications resulting from research funded by Plan S signatories, must be available on OA immediately on publication, under a CC-BY licence. This is reflected in the Wellcome open access policy which applies to original, peer-reviewed research articles that are supported in whole, or in part, by Wellcome, submitted from 1 January 2021.
How to comply
Wellcome have produced guidance on how to comply with their open access policy, which steps you through the routes to open access.
Please be aware of the requirement to include a rights retention statement when you submit your article, and use the Journal Checker Tool to see your options for the journals you're considering to submit to. This guidance explains how to use the Journal Checker Tool. For for an overview of rights retention, please have a look at the Library webpage here.
Can I meet the Wellcome OA requirements by publishing under a different licence?
Wellcome may allow a CC-BY-ND licence by exception, which must be sought in advance. For more information please see their guidance on applying for an No-Derivatives (ND) Licence exception.
What costs will Wellcome fund?
Please see the 'Costs we'll provide section' in the Wellcome open access policyPlease complete the St George’s Open Access Fund application form (opens as electronic form. St George's, University of London login required). Authors must apply for funding before an article is accepted for publication and have plans for alternative means of funding or publication should the application not be successful.
While it may be possible to authorise payment of an open access publication charge, if there is a 'no fee' way of making your paper open access (for instance via the read and publish deals or green route), this may be suggested rather than a paid route. Please contact openaccess if you have any queries. Staff from the Library or JRES will respond as appropriate.
Preprints
Wellcome-funded researchers are strongly encouraged to post preprints of their work, and publish them under a CC BY licence on a platform that is indexed in Europe PMC.
Where there is a significant public health benefit to preprints being shared widely and rapidly, such as a disease outbreak, they require the posting of preprints. For example, this requirement was relevant for the pandemic, as outlined in the Wellcome press release January 2021 Sharing research data and findings relevant to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
Monograph publications
The Wellcome Trust requires that original published monographs and book chapters arising from research they have funded be made freely available via the Europe PMC and the PMC Bookshelf repositories, as soon as possible and no later than within 6 months of the official final publication date. See Depositing your Wellcome-funded research.
Acknowledgement of funding
See How to acknowledge Wellcome’s support in your research publications.
Sanctions
If the publications do not meet the Wellcome Trust open access requirements, sanctions will apply, both for the researcher and their institution. For details, please refer to the section Monitoring compliance on the Wellcome Complying with our open access policy guidance.
eLife
The Wellcome Trust is one of the supporters of eLife, a non-profit open access online journal for biomedical and life sciences research.
Wellcome Open Research
Wellcome Open Research is a platform for rapid, open access publication and open peer review of any research funded by Wellcome.
Contacts
For all enquiries about open access, email the open access team.