APS Journals

APS and CERN Open Access Agreement

The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), based in Switzerland, is one of the world’s largest and most respected centers of scientific research. APS has undertaken an open access agreement with CERN to advance open science and research collaboration.

Read and Publish Agreement Terms and Conditions

Publisher: American Physical Society (APS)
Licensee: European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
Agreement Period: January 1, 2021 - 31 December 2026, inclusive of both dates
Member Institutions: Not applicable under this agreement
Read Access: Through this agreement, authorized users affiliated with CERN may obtain electronic access to the following online, licensed materials, including Physical Review Journals and related publications and products:

• all peer-reviewed Physical Review Journals published by APS
• Physical Review Online Archive (PROLA)
• Physics Magazine

Open Access Publishing
Participating Journals - The costs of publishing on an open access basis in the following journals are centrally covered by this agreement:

• Physical Review Letters (PRL)
• Physical Review A (PRA)
• Physical Review B (PRB)
• Physical Review C (PRC)
• Physical Review D (PRD)
• Physical Review E (PRE)
• Physical Review Applied (PRApplied)
• Physical Review Fluids (PRFluids)
• Physical Review Materials (PRMaterials)

Non-Participating Journals - Authors affiliated with CERN may submit to and publish in the following non-participating journals; a separate Article Publication Charge (APC) not covered by this agreement, may be required to publish on an open access basis:

• Physical Review X (PRX)
• PRX Energy
• PRX Quantum
• PRX Life
• Reviews of Modern Physics (RMP)
• Physical Review Research (PRResearch)
• Physical Review Accelerators and Beams (PRAB) (Please note that this is a diamond open access publication with no fees to readers or authors.)
• Physical Review Physics Education Research (PRPER)

Author Eligibility Criteria
Eligible Authors are:

1. officially affiliated with CERN, and
2. identified as the corresponding author in the initial instance of submission of a manuscript to one of the participating Physical Review Journals.
   • The eligible author cannot be changed after initial submission, including when the manuscript is transferred to another APS journal and where the corresponding author is changed.

Please note that some articles that do not include an initial corresponding author affiliated with CERN will also be covered by this agreement. This is detailed in the Article Eligibility Criteria.

Article Eligibility Criteria
Eligible Articles:

1. Meet one or both of the following conditions:
   • List CERN as the affiliation of the submitting author
   • Are produced as a part of the CERN Experimental Programme (Grey Book) - *please note that this does not include recognized experiments.
2. are accepted for publication by a Participating Journal during the Agreement Period,
3. are one of the article types acceptable under the policies of the Participating Journal, including but not limited to: Regular Articles, Letters, Rapid Communications, Reviews, Perspectives, and Short Papers.

Article Cap: There is no cap under this agreement, and eligible authors may publish unlimited articles.

Funds Transformed: The entirety of hybrid journals’ subscription and access fees may be transformed to support open access publishing.

SCOAP³
APS’s participation in SCOAP³ is fully considered and integrated into this agreement. Authors publishing their high-energy physics (HEP) research open access under SCOAP³ may continue to do so as usual. The purpose of this Read and Publish agreement is to provide centrally funded open access publishing services for authors publishing non-HEP research, and as such it complements APS’ participation in SCOAP³.

Please review the information about SCOAP³ and Physical Review Journals.

Learn more about eligibility: More information about CERN author eligibility is available through CERN Scientific Information Service and the CERN Author Guide.

More information
For further information or assistance, please contact help@aps.org. For more information about open access and Physical Review Journals, please review APS’s Institutional Open Access Agreements (IOAs).