If you are considering publishing in a BioMed Central journal, read on.

University of Manitoba researchers can submit papers to any of more than 200 BioMed Central journal titles free of charge. Normally the cost is $1,520 USD. No author fees are necessary because the U of M Libraries is already a pre-paid member. With Open Access Week just behind us, we thought this reminder might be timely.

BioMed Central is an open access publisher that uses an "author pays" business model to cover the costs associated with making research freely available in high-quality, peer-reviewed open access journals. However, there is an alternative to this model whereby the author's institution covers the cost, either partially or completely, through various membership options.

The University of Manitoba supports publication models that enable free, immediate, online distribution and access to scholarly research. For U of M researchers, therefore, the Libraries has opted to cover the complete cost of publication in BioMed Central.