IMPORTANT: No more funding for MDPI!
Publications submitted to the publisher MDPI will in the future be excluded from funding by the Publication Fund of the University of Göttingen (incl. UMG).

OA publishing of journal articles is supported by a number of different measures such as the participation of the University of Göttingen in transformative publishing agreements. For example, the DEAL project pursues the goal of concluding nationwide licensing agreements for electronic journals published by major scientific publishers. They include a ‘pure’ Open Access component and a ‘publish and read’ component. Researchers will then also be able to publish their article Open Access in journals with only partial Open Access provision, the so-called hybrid journals. In 2019, a transformation contract was concluded between DEAL and Wiley, as well as the contract with Springer Nature in 2020. Other contract components include negotiated discounts on publication costs in OA-only journals. The so-called ‘Article Processing Charges (APCs)’ are financed partly by the university publication fund, by the institutes' own funds or by third-party projects.

Most publishers offer corresponding OA options (e. g. Elsevier Online Open, Routledge Open Select) for subscription journals. This means that the same article is financed by subscription and OA publication fees. Since paying twice ('double dipping') for scholarly content in subscription-funded journals should be avoided, this option has never been eligible through the Publication Fund. Under strategically important transformation agreements (e. g., DEAL Wiley and DEAL Springer Nature), the costs for read-only access and OA publishing are combined into one license fee, thus resembling OA publishing in hybrid journals, which is not actually eligible for funding. Publishers and infrastructural institutions such as the SUB Göttingen are striving to create a fair and sustainable financing model for scholarly publishing in open access through this form of contract. Information on all existing agreements can be found on our Publishing Agreements section.

The resources of the open access publication fund may only be used for the payment of the pure open access fees (article processing charges, APC). Additional costs such as submission fees, color or page charges (etc.) must be paid from project or institute funds.

Financial support of article costs from the Fund, concerning articles with publication year 2023, are only possible until 24 January 2024, due to accounting reasons.

Note for authors from externally funded projects:

Funding for publishing must be applied for within the framework of third-party funded projects and these funds must also be used as a priority, both to cover the entire publication costs and in the case of subsidies from the central publication fund.

Please note:

• To qualify for funding, the invoice amount may not be split between two research institutions or invoice recipients. An invoice to be processed through the University of Göttingen must correspond to the total publication fees of the article.

• For article costs up to 2,000 Euro (gross), a full cost coverage can be provided.

• For article costs above 2,000 Euro (gross) the following applies:
  The costs for articles are split 50% each from the publication fund of the SUB Göttingen and the institution. A maximum of 2,000 Euro (gross) can be provided by the publication fund in such a case. Existing publication funds from projects must be used, if necessary also with a higher sum than the 50% proportionate publication costs.

Here is a note for authors of the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG):

The previous regulation for the UMG was only valid until 2021 and provided that the costs for only one article of 2,000 Euro to 5,000 Euro (gross) per calendar year were fully covered. The fees for other overpriced articles in OA-only journals had to be financed by the UMG institutions themselves. Since 2022, UMG has joined the university's cost regulation. As a result, more articles can now be subsidized, as well as articles with costs above 5,000 euros (gross).

You are a scientist at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen and as a 'corresponding author' you are responsible for paying publication fees.
ATTENTION: Since 01.11.2023, the new affiliation guideline of the University of Göttingen applies, according to which the first affiliation of the 'corresponding author' must be that of the University/University Medicine Göttingen in order to receive funding from the publication fund!

You publish in a 'pure' Open Access journal. The Directory of Open Access Journal (DOAJ) lists such journals. For journals that are not listed, we reserve the right to reject applications after a review if the required quality criteria are not met.
Since 2023 Mirror journals are excluded from funding despite DOAJ listing. As an indicator, the following list can be consulted: 'Mirror Journal List'. A mirror journal is a full freely available version (open access journal with evidence in DOAJ) of an existing subscription journal with mostly similar name. The objective, peer-review process and guidelines are similar or identical. The editorial board consists of at least 50% of the same members. In its funding program 'Open Access Publication Costs', the DFG has excluded these journals from funding.

All articles in the journal must be accessible worldwide free of charge in their entirety without a subscription fee and immediately upon publication.

The journal has a comprehensible review process for quality assurance that is appropriate to the subject (e. g. peer review).

Articles that appear in journals with paid open access options (e. g. Elsevier Online Open, Routledge Open Select) that are generally subject to a subscription fee cannot be supported by this fund.