RCSI has a number of agreements with publishers through IReL that allow RCSI corresponding authors to have articles made open access immediately with the publisher without payment of a further Article Processing Charge (APC).
The tabs in this box detail the current agreements in place and information on eligibility and conditions, and an IReL spreadsheet listing all the journals involved is available:
Journals included in RCSI agreements (in publisher order)
Agreement period: 1 January 2021 – 31 December 2025
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the American Chemical Society. The IReL-ACS agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current RCSI staff member or student at the time an article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals: all ACS journals
Eligible article types: peer-reviewed articles
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year.
Agreement period: 1 January 2025 — 31 December 2027
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the Annual Reviews. The IReL-Annual Reviews agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current RCSI staff member or student at the time an article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals: journals in the Subscribe to Open programme
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 31 December 2026
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the BMJ. The IReL-BMJ agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current RCSI staff member or student at the time an article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals: All 34 BMJ Hybrid journals
Note: RCSI does not currently subscribe to BMJ’s Institutional Fellowship, so RCSI staff and students submitting cases to BMJ Case Reports will need to pay the fees involved.
Agreement period: 1 January 2021 – 31 December 2025
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Cambridge University Press. The IReL-CUP agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals: All CUP hybrid and fully open access journals.
Eligible article types: a research, case report, brief report, review or rapid communications format article.
| UPDATE 8.1.25: a new agreement is under negotiation. Details below are for the 2021-24 agreement. Updated details will follow shortly. |
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 31 December 2024
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Electrochemical Society. The IReL-Electrochemical Society agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at article submission.
Eligible journals:
Note: at the time of manuscript submission, authors must select 'ECS Plus' and identify their affiliation.
Elsevier (Cell Press)
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 31 December 2026
RCSI is part of a new IReL agreement with Elsevier for Cell Press titles. The IReL-Elsevier agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost in all hybrid Cell Press journals.
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
Elsevier (ScienceDirect)
Agreement period: 1 January 2023 – 31 December 2025
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Elsevier. The IReL-Elsevier agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals: Most Elsevier fully-OA journals and most Elsevier hybrid journals. For further information, search the Elsevier Journal Finder for this agreement, which provides details of the journals included
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 31 December 2026
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Emerald. The IReL-Emerald agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time
Eligible journals: all Emerald Premier journals
Eligible article types: all peer-reviewed article content
RCSI affiliated authors receive a 10% discount on the Article Processing Charges in all MDPI journals. This is through MDPI’s Institutional Open Access Program (IOAP) agreement, renewed annually.
For any manuscript where at least one author is from RCSI, MDPI will grant a 10% reduction on the published APC for the journal. Only one discount is permitted per paper, and the discount cannot be combined with other available discounts.
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Microbiology Society. The IReL-Microbiology Society agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time
Eligible journals:
Areement period: 1 January 2025 – 31 December 2027
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the Optica Publishing Group. The IReL-OPG agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: at the time an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time
Eligible journals for OA publishing: nine specific journals (see IReL website for details)
Eligible article types: Research Articles, Letters, Memoranda, Opinions, Engineering & Laboratory Notes, Discussion, Negative Results, Reproducibility Studies, Tutorial.
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 1 January 2026
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Oxford University Press. The IReL-OUP agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: at the time of an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time
Eligible journals: all OUP hybrid journals (subscription journals which include open access content).
Eligible article types: all article types
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
Agreement period: 1 January 2025 – 31 December 2027
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the Rockefeller University Press. The IReL-RUP agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: The corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals for OA publishing:
Eligible article types: Article, Brief Definitive Report, Communication, Hypothesis, Methods and Approaches, Report, Technical Advances and Resources, and Tools.
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2026
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the Royal Society. The IReL-Royal Society agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost
Eligible authors: The corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time the article is accepted for publication. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals for OA publishing:
Eligible article types: Letters to the Editor, corrections, retractions are excluded
Agreement period: 1 January 2025 – 31 December 2028
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with the Royal Society of Chemistry. The IReL-RSC agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: at the time an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals for OA publishing: all RSC journals (both hybrid and Gold)
Eligible article types: all research articles and review papers.
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
Agreement period: 1 January 2025 – 31 December 2027
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Springer. The IReL-Springer agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: at the time an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals for OA publishing: more than 2,000 Springer hybrid journals. Details of the agreement including lists of eligible journals available here.
Eligible article types: original paper, review paper, brief communication, continuing education.
Note 1: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year.
Note 2: BMC journals are not included under the agreement.
Agreement period: 1 January 2024 – 31 December 2026
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Taylor & Francis. The IReL-T&F agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: at the time an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student with a participating institution. The corresponding author must ensure their correct affiliation details are known to the publisher at this time.
Eligible journals for OA publishing:
All T&F Open Select journals (hybrid journals)
Eligible article types: Article, Review, Research Article, Review Article, Report, Short Communication, Case Report, Note, Original Article, Guest Editorial.
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
Agreement period: 1 January 2023 to 31 December 2025
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with The Company of Biologists. The IReL-Company of Biologists agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Agreement period: 1 January 2025 – 31 December 2028
RCSI is part of an IReL agreement with Wiley. The IReL-Wiley agreement allows eligible corresponding authors to publish open access upon publication at no extra cost.
Eligible authors: the corresponding author must be a current staff member or student of a participating institution at the time of editorial acceptance
Eligible journals for OA publishing: all Wiley hybrid (partially open access) and Gold (fully open access) journals. A small number of Wiley subscription-only journals are excluded
Eligible article types: Case Study, Case Study Media, Commentary, Data Article, Education, Lecture, Method and Protocol, Perspective, Practice and Policy, Rapid Publication, Research Article, Review Article, Short Communication, Technical Note.
Note: there are limitations to the number of papers under this scheme, so the allocations may be used up prior to the end of the year
For the hybrid scheme, funding is allocated to articles based on the editorial acceptance date i.e. for an article to be eligible it must be accepted on a date between January and December 2024 (providing funds are still available)
For the fully open-access scheme, funding is allocated to articles based on the submission date, i.e. for an article to be eligible, it must be submitted on a date between January and December 2024 (providing funds are still available)