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Measure Calls for Wider Access to Federally Financed Research

June 26, 2003
By WARREN E. LEARY






WASHINGTON, June 25 - A group challenging the power of
established scientific journals says legislation will be
introduced to make the results of all federally financed
research available to the public.

The group, the Public Library of Science, which includes
scientists, doctors, researchers and their public
supporters, plans to announce legislation on Thursday that
would give taxpayers greater access to scientific data.

The group's objective is an open system of scientific
publishing that would bypass the current system, which
centers on journals that charge, through their
subscriptions, for access to results.

The measure places results of research financed primarily
by the government into the public domain so access cannot
be prohibited by copyright, said Dr. Michael B. Eisen, a
co-founder of the library, and a biologist at Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory. The bill also calls on
federal agencies to improve access to their research
results.

Representative Martin Olav Sabo, Democrat of Minnesota, is
to introduce the measure, called the Public Access to
Science Act. A spokesman said that Mr. Sabo was concerned
about patients' access to the latest medical research and
that he would seek co-sponsors for the bill.

American taxpayers invest about $45 billion a year in
scientific and medical research, and the results should be
readily available to them, Mr. Sabo said.

"It defies logic to collectively pay for our medical
research, only to privatize its profitability and
availability," he said in a statement.

Dr. Harold E. Varmus, president of the Memorial
Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York and chairman of
the Public Library of Science, said the legislation would
help get out the message that scientific results should be
more easily available to more people.

"Privately owned journals can't tie up scientific
information, and people should begin discussing this
issue," Dr. Varmus said.

The Public Library of Science, with the help of a $9
million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation,
will begin publishing an online, peer-reviewed journal on
biology in October, followed by a medical science journal
early next year.

Access to the journals is to be free, and the operating
expenses are to be financed by $1,500 fees charged to
researchers whose papers appear. Most research grants are
large enough to include payments for publishing results,
proponents say.

Traditional journals like Nature and Science publish papers
at no charge to researchers but recoup costs and sometimes
make profits with advertising and paid subscriptions, on
paper and online.

Dr. Alan I. Leshner, chief executive of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science, which publishes
the journal Science, said everyone concerned with
scientific publishing was looking for the best way to
improve assess to information on the Internet and
elsewhere.

"We are all looking for the best model to assure access to
quality scientific information," Dr. Leshner said, "We're
experimenting with different methods to do the same thing."


Science magazine, for instance, is giving free online
access to institutions in developing countries and
providing site licenses to hundreds of universities so that
everyone on those campuses has free access.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/26/politics/26LIBR.html?ex=1057619713&ei=1&en
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