Agreement between Washington University in St. Louis and Elsevier
Elsevier and Washington University in St. Louis have established an agreement to support affiliated authors who wish to publish open access.
The cost of publishing open access for eligible corresponding authors is subsidized under the terms of this agreement. When publishing open access in selected core hybrid journals including Cell Press hybrid journals, the agreement will cover the article processing charge (APC) for a specific number of articles per year of the agreement. Eligible corresponding authors who publish in fully gold journals including Gold Cell Press and Gold Lancet journals will receive a discount on the APC.
How does the process work?
The process of publishing under the agreement is straightforward:
Step 1 – Once the journal accepts your article, you will receive an email containing a link to the “post acceptance author journey”.
Step 2 – You will be asked to review your affiliation and funder details. Based on this information, you will see personalised publishing options including the option to publish under the agreement.
Step 3 – You will confirm your publishing choices and complete the post acceptance journey.
Step 4 – Your institution will validate your eligibility for the agreement.
Step 5 – You and your co-authors will receive an email to confirm that the APC will be covered by the agreement. Please note that the number of APCs included under the agreement is fixed and will be allocated based on date of acceptance.
During the submission process, the system will present you with personalised publishing options including any agreement or offer that you may be eligible for. You can indicate your publishing choice during submission, but you are not required to finalize your choice until after acceptance. There is a maximum number of articles in core hybrid and Cell Press hybrid journals that may be published as open access under this agreement. If the limit is reached, this agreement will not cover the APC for the author.
Which institutions are covered by this agreement?
This agreement supports corresponding authors (see FAQ at the bottom of this page) affiliated with Washington University in St. Louis.
Which journals are included in this agreement?
Authors can publish eligible articles (see FAQ at the bottom of this page) in a wide variety of participating Elsevier journals across a range of disciplines.
What are the author benefits of publishing open access with Elsevier?
When you publish open access with Elsevier, you get the attention you deserve. We offer authors:
Choice – We have open access journals across every scientific discipline.
Support – Receive expert support throughout submission, during peer review, and post-acceptance.
Visibility – Your final published article will be published on ScienceDirect, the number one research platform in the world.
To learn more about the benefits of publishing open access with Elsevier visit our Open Access Author Hub.
Are there other publishing options?
Authors can continue to choose to publish under the subscription model which includes the option to self-archive their manuscript (Green Open Access) in line with Elsevier’s sharing policy.
Eligibility FAQs
Articles must have an original submission date between 2024 and 31 December 2027.
For the purpose of eligibility under the agreement, there can only be one corresponding author. The corresponding author is the author who submits the manuscript and other documentation to the journal and is the primary contact between the journal and the co-authors. Importantly, the corresponding author’s affiliation will be used to determine eligibility for the publishing agreement. The affiliations of other co-authors are not relevant for agreement eligibility.
The corresponding author’s responsibilities include:
Ensuring that all authors have complied with the journal’s policies, including reviewing and approving the final version of the manuscript prior to submission.
Distributing and responding to communications from the journal (e.g., decision letters, reviewers’ reports).
Completing the post publication author journey including signing the Journal Publishing License Agreement, Rights and Access information form, and selection of open access options on behalf of, and with the agreement of, all co-authors of the paper.
Journals may follow requests of the team of authors and display other corresponding authors in the published article. Which corresponding authors are displayed on the published paper, however, is not relevant for agreement eligibility.
With this agreement, authors have a choice between a commercial (CC BY) or non-commercial (CC BY-NC-ND or CC BY-NC) license. The license choice is dependent on the journal selected. Please refer to the journal's homepage for specific details.
The following article types are part of this agreement:
Case reports
Data in Briefs
Full-length articles
Micro-articles
Original software publication
Practice guidelines
Protocols
Review articles
Replication studies
Short communications
Short surveys
Video articles