Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences
Open Access publication under “big deals” and the new copyright rules
Read-and-publish agreements, so-called “Big Deals”, facilitate Gold Open Access publications. ALLEA, the European federation of Academies, applauds this but stresses that they fail to deliver on the promise of an equitable system for sharing and accessing research publications. While EU and national copyright laws provide for many rules to foster such systems, current agreements do not take them into account. ALLEA therefore recommends researchers and libraries to better consider their rights when negotiating future deals and to depart from the rights assignment model that prevails today. Also, national copyright legislation should be harmonised , EU-wide Secondary Publication Rights without embargo introduced and community-driven non-profit publishing ecosystem further developed.
Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences a+
Lighthouse Programmes in Sustainability Research and Innovation
Wuelser G, Edwards P (2025)
Lighthouse Programmes in Sustainability Research and Innovation
Swiss Academies Reports 20 (4)Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences a+
Ethical guidelines for animal experiments
The Swiss Animal Welfare Act permits the use of animals for certain scientific purposes; at the same time, however, it requires that the dignity of animals be respected and their welfare protected. For researchers, reconciling these various societal interests can be challenging. The ethical guidelines for animal experiments (2025) are designed to clarify the margin of discretion left by the legislation and to encourage researchers to reflect on the handling of animals in their experiments. The decisive factors for updating the previous version from 2005 were new scientific knowledge and research methods on the one hand, as well as changes in the legal framework on the other.
