OceanRep has been established to promote open access to research results. Open access means that the documents are freely accessible to all who have access to the internet.

The immediate benefits of an open access archive are several. Researchers and research institutions can document their production and make their research products available and searchable to a large audience. Open access to research products can thereby support the building of international research networks. Open access has been shown to increase not only the access but also the impact of papers in terms of citations (e.g. Gargouri u.a., 2010: „Open Access wird häufiger zitiert.“).

In the long run, the quality of the research can be improved by way of enhanced communication of research results. As a research institution, GEOMAR is reliant on free access to information and exchange of knowledge that is essential for innovative research and development. Therefore, the GEOMAR is in full support of the open access principles. In this respect, the public shall possess the right to access information and results of researches or projects which are run on public funding.

GEOMAR is part of an international open access movement that promotes free online access to the publications funded by the public, see the Budapest Open Access Initiative and the Berlin Declaration. SPARC together with the SPARC Open Access Newsletter and the attached Forum is an excellent source of information.

To enhance the visibility, OceanRep is harvested by following portals: OpenAire and BASE.

As part of the open access movement open access archives are being created, see e.g. Open Archives Initiative (OAI). Free open source software for creating such archives is available from EPrints.org and DSpace.org. Archives that meet the OAI standards can be searched and harvested by cross-archive tools.

More specific information, that can help you decide what access you can give to particular documents, is available at our statements page.