The international momentum towards making research literature much more accessible to a wider audience is great to see. The United States has now sent an important signal of its commitment to this agenda.

Open access – and open science more broadly – are complex reforms that require close consideration of all players in the science ecosystem, including funding bodies, researchers, reviewers, and publishers.

The approaches to open access will differ, depending on the systems and aims unique to each country, but the issues are similar.

I’m working to preserve the important role of peer review, a task usually done for free and increasingly burdensome in a world of increasing research output. It is also generally anonymous, which has implications for fairness, safety and for efforts to build diversity.

Publishers also have an important role. They are the custodians of research knowledge. They provide the practical essentials of organising, cataloguing, and ensuring search accessibility. They also provide the quality control of organising peer review and editorship.

The back catalogue remains an issue for consideration. The reality of science advancement is that discovery is an iterative process that builds on what has gone before, which means facilitating access to previously published work.

Sustainable funding is another of the challenges. Quite simply, publishing and publishing infrastructure cost money. It is not a magic process by an invisible hand. The pricing issue is complex, as is the question of how to deal with access to papers that fall outside large-scale open-access agreements.

There is no need to start from scratch; the system has value, and the aim is to preserve what is valuable as we shift towards a new model. I invite people across the research and publishing ecosystem to help decision-makers find the innovative solutions to the challenges, so we can both protect what we have and make progress towards this important reform.

In Australia, my aims are ambitious. I’m working with the sector towards a model that makes Australian-led research literature available to the international audience without paywalls. I’m also working to unlock the research literature, including international and back-catalogue papers, for all Australians to read.

We are operating in an increasingly knowledge-based global economy. Bringing research literature out from behind paywalls will contribute to social cohesion and a culture of collaboration. It will drive discovery, innovation, and prosperity.

Biography

Dr Cathy Foley AO PSM became Australia’s ninth Chief Scientist in January 2021 after an extensive career at Australia’s national science agency, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, including as the agency’s Chief Scientist.

Dr Foley is an internationally recognised physicist with major research achievements in superconductors and sensors which lead to the development of the LANDTEM sensor system to locate valuable deposits of minerals deep underground.

Dr Foley’s scientific excellence and influential leadership have been recognised with numerous awards and fellowships, including election to the Australian Academy of Science in 2020, and an Order of Australia for service to research science and to the advancement of women in physics. She received the Australian Institute of Physics Medal for Outstanding Service to Physics in 2016. She is a Fellow of Australian Academy of Technological Science and Engineering (2008) and an honorary Fellow of the Australian Institute of Physics (2019).

Dr Foley is an inspiration to women in STEM across the globe and focused strongly on equality and diversity in the science sector.