Guide for corresponding authors at institutions with Read & Publish and other transformative Open Access agreements

Corresponding authors at institutions with standard Read & Publish agreements can publish Open Access research articles free of charge in our subscription journals – Development, Journal of Cell Science and Journal of Experimental Biology.

In addition we are piloting variations of our standard Read & Publish agreement with the Max Planck Digital Library and University of California. These agreements also include our fully Open Access journals – Disease Models & Mechanisms and Biology Open.

Step 1: Check if the corresponding author’s institution has a Read & Publish or other transformative Open Access agreement with The Company of Biologists.

The following guide to the article submission process applies to corresponding authors at institutions listed here. If your institution is not on the list, you may wish to contact your library to find out if they are planning to participate soon.

Step 2: Submit your article using our Bench>Press submission system

Follow the link to the submission system for your chosen journal below.

(*Corresponding authors from Max Planck Society Institutes and University of California campuses only)

If you already have a Bench>Press account, log on using your existing username and password. If you are a first-time user, you will need to create an account.
Enter the “Author Area” and select “Submit a new manuscript”.
The affiliation of the corresponding author is used to determine eligibility for discounted or waived article processing charges so please ensure that the corresponding author is agreed before submission.
When providing your contact details, please include your institutional email address, as well as the full name and address of your institution, including country.
Follow the on-screen instructions and be sure to select “Gold Open Access” and “Read & Publish fee waiver”.

Step 3: What you need to do if your article is accepted

Complete and return the Publication Agreement in your Bench>Press Author Area.
We will send you a link to our RightsLink system and, if your institution is participating in our Read & Publish agreement, an automatic fee-waiver will be applied.
Select “Seek funding from [name of institution]” and then click “next”. You will be taken to the sign in page of our RightsLink Open Access payment system. If you already have an account, log in using your existing username and password. If you are a first-time user, you will need to create an account.
When you are signed in, you can review your details, approve the terms and conditions, and select ‘Submit for Approval’.
You will receive a confirmation email as soon as your institution confirms that you are eligible for free OA publishing under their Read & Publish agreement with us. A PDF proof of your article will be sent to you for review, and the final approved version will be published under an Open Access CC BY license.

Step 4: Promote and share your article

Your article will be published Open Access. This means you can share the article as widely as you like (via social media and scholarly collaboration networks, by email, in your teaching etc) in the knowledge that everyone worldwide – regardless of their institution’s licensing arrangements – can read it and share it further.

Any questions? Please click on the links below to email the relevant journal:

Guide for corresponding authors at institutions with Read & Publish and other transformative Open Access agreements

Read & Publish: participating institutions

Read & Publish for researchers

What do authors say?

Read & Publish: frequently asked questions

16 years of Open Access publishing