PhysMath Central, the Open Access publisher for Physics, Mathematics and Computer Science, today announced membership agreements with the CERN and DESY high-energy physics laboratories. Under these agreements the organizations will centrally cover article-processing charges for all research published by their investigators in the peer-reviewed open access journal, PMC Physics A.
PMC Physics A is edited by professor Ken Peach of University of Oxford and Royal Holloway and was launched in October 2007. All articles published in the journal are made immediately and freely available on the web in their final published form and are indexed by speciality databases such as SPIRES.
Jens Vigen, CERN head librarian commented “This membership program is an important, intermediate, step towards the SCOAP3 publishing model, where high-energy physics literature will be open access and article processing costs borne centrally in a transparent way for authors”. Salvatore Mele, SCOAP3 project leader, echoing Vigen’s views, stated “The SCOAP3 consortium will be open to all high-quality peer-reviewed journals, including emerging publishing outlets as well as established titles”.
Rolf-Dieter Heuer, Research Director at DESY, is also optimistic about the future. "We at DESY have long been active supporters of open access and welcome this new OA journal. This is another important step in removing access barriers to knowledge about high-energy physics experiments and theories. Increased choice and diversity is a benefit to all, leading to a healthy and dynamic market in academic publishing in particle physics, in line with the spirit of SCOAP³."
PhysMath Central’s Christopher Leonard commented, “We are exceptionally pleased to welcome these major institutions on board. This reinforces CERN and DESY’s commitment to supporting open access publication of the research from their laboratories. Central funding for article processing charges makes life much simpler for authors, and so accelerates the take up of open access.”
Notes to Editors
1) About PhysMath Central
PhysMath Central is part of the Open Access Central group of publishers, committed to providing immediate open access to peer-reviewed research. Other members of the group include BioMed Central and Chemistry Central. All research articles published by PhysMath Central are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication.
The first publications from CERN and DESY on PhysMath Central are:
Semi-analytical approach to magnetized temperature autocorrelations
Massimo Giovannini
PMC Physics A 2007, 1:5 (18 October 2007)
http://www.physmathcentral.com/1754-0410/1/5/abstract
Exclusive rho0 production in deep inelastic scattering at HERA
ZEUS Collaboration
PMC Physics A 2007, 1:6 (12 November 2007)
http://www.physmathcentral.com/1754-0410/1/6/abstract
2) About The German Electron Synchrotron (DESY)
The German Electron Synchrotron DESY, Member of the Helmholtz Association, is one of the leading accelerator centers in the world. DESY is a national research center supported by public funds and has locations in Hamburg and Zeuthen (Brandenburg).
3) About the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. India, Israel, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status.
4) About BioMed Central
BioMed Central is an independent publishing house committed to providing immediate open access to peer-reviewed biomedical research
All original research articles published by BioMed Central are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication. BioMed Central views open access to research as essential in order to ensure the rapid and efficient communication of research findings