PLOS

PLOS (Public Library of Science) is a nonprofit open access scientific publishing project aimed at creating a library of open access journals and other scientific literature under an open content license. It launched its first journal, PLOS Biology, in October 2003 and publishes seven journals, as of October 2015.

History

The Public Library of Science began in early 2000 by biochemist Patrick O. Brown and molecular biologist Michael Eisen from Stanford University and Harold E. Varmus, a Nobel laureate and former director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The founders were concerned about the financial and intellectual barriers that prevented the widespread distribution of research results and the use of this knowledge in the public domain.

Journals

PLOS publishes a suite of influential Open Access journals across all areas of science and medicine. These include:

• PLOS ONE
• PLOS Biology
• PLOS Medicine
• PLOS Computational Biology
• PLOS Genetics
• PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases
• PLOS Pathogens

Open Access

PLOS asserts that the only way to ensure that the scientific method is fairly applied and fully utilized is to make it free and open. This is in contrast to the traditional method of dealing with scientific knowledge, which involves subscription fees, site licenses or pay-per-view charges.

See Also

• Open Access
• Scientific Publishing
• Public Domain

References

PLOS Resources
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