Penn Libraries announces open access agreements with Wolters Kluwer Health and Nature

The Penn Libraries is pleased to announce two new open access agreements with the publishers Wolters Kluwer Health and Nature, effective July 1. These agreements expand the portfolio of venues where Penn- affiliated authors can publish open access without cost. Both agreements run through 2029.

The agreements advance the Libraries' commitment to ensuring that knowledge generated at Penn can benefit the widest possible audience. 

“Penn’s research is most consequential when we remove barriers to accessing it," says Alexa Pearce, Gershwind & Bennett Family Associate Vice Provost for Collections and Scholarly Communications at the Penn Libraries. "These agreements with Nature and Wolters Kluwer are exciting and vital contributions to our goal of opening Penn’s scholarship to the world.”

Details on Wolters Kluwer Health and Nature agreements

On average, Penn-affiliated authors publish more than 300 articles annually with Wolters Kluwer Health publications, placing it among the top five publishers of Penn scholarship. Wolters Kluwer provides health sciences resources from more than 150 publishers; its offerings include the Ovid research platform and the influential Lippincott Williams and Wilkins (LWW) journal portfolio. This open access agreement covers the LWW Total Access Collection of 300+ global medical, nursing, and allied health research titles. 

The journal Nature and its constellation of research journals publish peer-reviewed research in all fields of science and technology. The suite of publications is widely read, with Nature.com reaching more than 8 million visitors each month. Articles from these journals are heavily cited and frequently covered in news stories that reach audiences across the globe. Primary articles by Penn affiliated-authors—that is, those that include original, previously unpublished research findings—are now eligible for open access publishing in Nature and its research journals.

For more information on what the Wolters Kluwer and Nature agreements mean for Penn researchers, including details about eligible authors and articles, see our online guide to Open Access Agreements for Penn Authors.

Commitment to Sharing Penn Scholarship Globally

By promoting open access policies that increase the global reach of Penn’s scholarship, the Penn Libraries strengthens the University's contributions to the world’s most pressing problems. Open access publications enable worldwide access to cutting-edge research, while also benefiting authors by enhancing the reach and impact of their work. Research funders, including federal agencies, increasingly require that research they have funded be made freely accessible to the public.

In addition to the new agreements with Wolters Kluwer and Nature, the Penn Libraries currently holds open access agreements with the following publishers: Association for Computing Machinery, Cambridge University Press, Company of Biologists, Elsevier, Emerald, Institute of Physics, John Benjamins Publishing Company, Oxford University Press, Royal Society of Chemistry, Sage Publishing, Springer, and Wiley. A newly available open journal finder tool supports the Penn community in identifying individual journal titles that are covered by the Libraries’ open access agreements.

The Penn Libraries offers comprehensive ongoing support for Penn authors who are preparing to publish their research. Penn Libraries staff provide direct support in developing a better understanding of open access, copyright, citation best practices, Creative Commons licenses, choosing a journal or other publication venue, preprints, publisher contracts, and more. Find publishing resources, contacts, and workshops on our website.