Scholarly Resources: Acquisitions & Cancellations

Support for OA publishing via VIVA (Updated September 2025)

The University Libraries contributes to several read and publish agreements via VIVA, Virginia’s academic library consortium. These agreements cover OA publishing fees for articles in eligible journals with a Mason corresponding author.

VIVA's open access agreements are listed below in alphabetical order by publisher, with links to additional information.

In order to take advantage of the OA publishing benefits of these agreements, the corresponding author must (a) be Mason affiliated and (b) use their gmu.edu email address.

There are no library funds for OA publishing in journals outside these agreements. 

PLOS Update: VIVA's open access publishing agreement with PLOS comes to an end on 12/31/25. Articles must be formally accepted for publication by December 31, 2025, to be covered under the current agreement. As all PLOS journals are fully open access, faculty and students will still be able to read and download PLOS content at no cost.

• American Chemical Society (ACS): New in January 2024. Mason corresponding authors may publish journal articles open access at no additional cost to the author. Covers all ACS journals (over 70 titles). Detailed information forthcoming.

• Association for Computing Machinery (ACM): This agreement covers OA publishing in ACM journals, magazines, and proceedings. It does not cover OA publishing in books and book chapters.

• Cambridge University Press: Covers OA publishing in almost all CUP journals. Around 12 journals do not allow any open access at this time. 

• Institute of Physics (IOP): Covers OA publishing in IOP journals, not including the American Astronomical Society (AAS) journals. 

• International Water Association (IWA): Covers OA publishing in IWA's four Gold (fee-based) OA journals: Blue-Green Systems, H2Open Journal, Hydrology Research, and Water Reuse. Also contributes to sustaining IWA's ten subscribe-to-open (zero author fee) OA journals.

• PLOS: Mason corresponding authors can publish open access in the following seven journals ONLY, at no additional cost to the author. PLOS Complex Systems, PLOS Computational Biology, PLOS Digital Health, PLOS Genetics, PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases, PLOS ONE, PLOS Pathogens. The Libraries cannot cover OA fees for any other PLOS journals.
  • PLOS Update: VIVA's open access publishing agreement with PLOS comes to an end on 12/31/25. Articles must be formally accepted for publication by December 31, 2025, to be covered under the current agreement. As all PLOS journals are fully open access, faculty and students will still be able to read and download PLOS content at no cost.​​​​​​​

• Rockefeller University Press: Covers OA publishing in RUP's three hybrid journals—Journal of Cell Biology (JCB), Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM), and Journal of General Physiology (JGP). 

• Springer: New in January 2024. Mason corresponding authors may publish articles open access in select Springer journals (2043 out of over 2300 journals) at no additional cost to the author. Detailed information forthcoming.

  • Authors should confirm they are submitting to a journal covered by this agreement. 

  • Nature brand journals are not covered by this agreement.  

  • BioMed Central journals are not covered by this agreement. Mason no longer has any APC discounts with BioMed Central. 

• Wiley: Covers OA publishing in Gold and Hybrid OA journals.