In 2005 the National Institutes of Health (NIH) adapted a voluntary measure suggesting that agency-funded investigators provide public access of their research papers into the National Library of Medicine’s online archive, PubMed Central.

President Bush’s signature on H.R. 2764, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2007, now requires the full text of articles to be made publicly available and searchable no later than 12 months after publication in a journal.

The public’s open access to NIH funded research helps in their mission to provide material to higher education.