IS-MPMI represents an international community—the last IS-MPMI Congress was attended by scientists from more than 50 countries—and this diversity is reflected in the authorship of articles in the MPMI journal. Changes in the publishing landscape, both in the ways authors publish their work and the ways readers access content, as well as a growing awareness that research should be available to teachers, students, and colleagues worldwide, have led to the decision to turn MPMI into a gold open access journal. Beginning January 2021, all MPMI content will be fully available to everyone.

Jeanne Harris, MPMI editor-in-chief, envisions the journal as a place to tackle the big questions in molecular plant–microbe interactions. “We want to position MPMI to be a place where the community discusses these big questions. Not just what we’ve done but looking forward at the big questions that face us.” She sees this move to open access as a way to foster inclusion, drawing all voices into the discussion.

Since Harris took over as editor-in-chief in 2018, MPMI has transitioned from being a print publication to online-only delivery and made all technical advances freely available, which were important first steps toward becoming open access. “Plants live all over the world; microbes live all over the world,” Harris said. “When we look at the people who make up our IS-MPMI community, we see that the members are from all over the world, and not every place has subscription access. It was clear that MPMI had to go open access to reach our entire community.”

According to Krishna Subbarao, chair of The American Phytopathological Society’s Publications Board, it was “especially vital that MPMI move to open access because many of the journals in the molecular area were already gold open access,” and some European authors were prevented from publishing in journals without full open access due to constraints from funding agencies or institutions. Subbarao states, “We hope that the European authors will welcome this change and that this move to gold open access attracts authors from every part of the world.”

MPMI currently makes both resource announcements and technical advances open access so that they can be a resource for the community, and review articles are freely available for a month. However, Harris has championed the move toward fully open access. “These ideas and the findings really should be shared,” she said.

With the gold open access launch in 2021, the MPMI journal will become more accessible than ever and can serve as a community meeting place for all. Authors are encouraged to submit their articles now to be included in the first open access issues. Articles submitted today will be openly available for everyone in our community as they are published. Learn more about the journal.

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