NIH Policy Documents

On April 7th, the new National Institutes of Health policy requiring the deposit of publications resulting from NIH grants in an open access repository within 12 months of publication will be implemented. On our campus, compliance with grant and federal guidelines is part of the Office of Research. Vice President of Research, Jim Tracy, has provided three documents for researchers who are affected by these new requirements.

As this new law was making its way through the legislative process, the University of Kentucky took an official position of support (see Dean’s Update October 6, 2006), so we are delighted that this policy is now law.

Those of you who work with faculty regularly in the sciences and medicine may encounter questions from researchers. I have posted the documents distributed by Vice President Tracy on SharePoint under Office of the Dean, Scholarly Communication, for your information. The Medical Center Library also has links from their home page. Since this is a critical compliance issue for the University, it’s important that our researchers receive accurate and up to date information. Vice President Tracy’s memo includes the following contacts for questions:

“You should also feel free to refer researchers to the If you have questions about the NIH policy, please contact Deborah Davis in the Office of Sponsored Projects Administration (phone: 257-8311; ddavis@email.uky.edu). Katherine Adams in the Office of Legal Counsel (phone: 257-2936; kadams@email.uky.edu) can answer questions about language in publishing/copyright transfer agreements. You may also contact me directly (jtracy@email.uky.edu).”