Open Access & Self Archiving

Open access refers to free, unrestricted online access to research outputs such as journal articles and books. Open access content is open to all, with no access fees.

There are two main routes to making your research openly accessible:

• Publishing your article fully open access, often referred to as gold open access, via the open access route on a publisher’s platform. Gold open access makes the final version of an article freely and permanently accessible for everyone, immediately after publication. Copyright for the article is retained by the authors and most of the permission barriers are removed. Authors are required to pay an article processing charge (APC) to facilitate open access publication.
• Publishing your article via the traditional subscription route but archiving a version of the manuscript in an open access repository, making it freely accessible for everyone after a set embargo period - often described as green open access.  Unlike gold open access the version deposited must be the author accepted version (prior to copyediting and typesetting) rather than the final published pdf. The copyright for these articles remains with the publisher of, or the society affiliated with, the title and there are restrictions as to how the work can be reused. 

Open access and self-archiving

Self-archiving and manuscript deposition (green open access)

Where articles are published via the subscription route, Springer Nature permits authors to self-archive the accepted manuscript (the version post-peer review, but prior to copy-editing and typesetting) on their own personal website and/or in their funder or institutional repositories, for public release after an embargo period of six months after first publication. Springer Nature also offers a free, opt-in Manuscript Deposition Service for original research articles in order to help authors fulfil a number of funder and institutional mandates.

A number of research funding agencies now require or request authors to submit accepted articles (after peer review and acceptance, but before the final published article) to a repository that is accessible online by all without charge. As a service, Springer Nature and Mucosal Immunology can help authors of primary research articles ("Articles" only) fulfill these mandates by archiving your manuscript in PubMed Central and/or UK PubMed Central on your behalf. Authors can select this option and provide details on their funding agencies during submission. A list of funders that Springer Nature deposits on behalf of is available here.

All authors are encouraged to submit their version of the accepted, peer-reviewed manuscript to their funding body’s archive, for public release six months after publication. In addition, authors are encouraged to archive their version of the manuscript in their institution’s repositories (as well as on their personal web sites), also six months after the original publication. Authors should cite the publication reference and doi number on any deposited version, and provide a link from it to the published article on the Springer Nature website. This policy complements the policies of the US National Institutes of Health, the Wellcome Trust and other research funding bodies around the world. Springer Nature recognizes the efforts of funding bodies to increase access of the research they fund, and strongly encourages authors to participate in such efforts.

Learn more about self-archiving and manuscript deposition.

Open access publication (gold open access)

Authors of research articles can opt to pay an article processing charge (APC) for their accepted articles to be open access online immediately upon publication. Open access articles are published under a CC BY license (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License). Under Creative Commons, authors retain copyright in their articles. The CC BY license allows for maximum dissemination and re-use of open access materials and is preferred by many research funding bodies. Under this license, users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit) and remix (adapt) the contribution including for commercial purposes, providing they attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor (read full legal code). All Springer Nature journals with an open access option offer intergovernmental organisation (IGO) versions of Creative Commons licences on request, where required by the author’s employer.

To facilitate self-archiving Springer Nature deposits open access articles in PubMed Central and Europe PubMed Central on publication. Authors are also permitted to post the final, published PDF of their article on a website, institutional repository or other free public server immediately on publication.

Visit our open research site for detailed information about publishing open access in Mucosal Immunology:

• Creative Commons licensing
• Creative Commons license options and APCs for Mucosal Immunology
• APC payment FAQs
• Help in identifying funding for APCs

Compliance with open access mandates

Springer Nature's publishing policies ensure that authors can comply with the public access requirements of many major funding bodies worldwide. Authors may need to take specific actions to achieve compliance with funder and institutional open access mandates. If your research is supported by a funder that requires immediate open access (e.g. according to Plan S principles) then you should select the gold OA route, and we will direct you to the compliant route where possible. For authors selecting the subscription publication route, the journal's standard licensing terms will need to be accepted, including self-archiving policies. Those licensing terms will supersede any other terms that the author or any third party may assert apply to any version of the manuscript.

Retrospective open access

Authors who initially opted to publish their paper under the subscription model in a hybrid journal may be able to retrospectively pay an article processing charge (APC) to make their paper open access. To request retrospective open access for an article that has already been published, please contact the Open Research Support Team at ORSupport@springernature.com with your Article’s title, DOI and Journal name.

For help deciding whether open access is right for you, and which open access license to choose, please click here.

For any questions relating to pricing please see the Springer Nature Journal Pricing FAQs page.

Standard Publication 

Waiver of institutional open access policies
Please note that Harvard University FAS, MIT, Princeton, UCSF, University of Hawaii at Manoa, California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the Georgia Institute of Technology have enacted Open Access policies that conflict with our own policy for articles published via the subscription route. If any corresponding or contributing authors are from these institutions, you may need to provide a waiver from the institution of every affected author, which can be obtained from the institution. If such a waiver is required, please provide them along with your final files. This requirement does not apply to articles published via the open access route.

To facilitate self-archiving, we deposit open access articles in PubMed Central on publication if the article meets the PMC deposition guidelines; full details of our deposition policies are found under the “Self-archiving, manuscript deposition, and digital preservation” information here. Authors are also permitted to post the final, published PDF of their article on a website, institutional repository or other free public server immediately on publication.

Digital preservation

Springer Nature ensures that publications are preserved and available for future scholars, researchers, and students. Find out more about archiving agreements with Digital Preservation organizations here.