The 2022 Office of Science and Technology Policy "Nelson" Memo directs all federal agencies providing research funding to create and adopt policies to ensure no-embargo access to scholarly publications and underlying research data resulting from those funds. Policies are to be implemented no later than December 31, 2025.

This means articles must be open access immediately upon publication. For agencies with policies in place as of October 2025, this does not require publishing in an open access journal. Instead, agencies have generally directed that a version of the article be deposited in a designated open access repository, PubMed Central being the most common.

As of right now, the most comprehensive guide to the policy landscape in response to this memo is at SPARC's 2022 OSTP Public Access Memo Guidance page. Interested readers should consult there for specific federal agency policies (NIH, NSF, DOE, NEH, etc.). For the NIH policies specifically, see also the NIH Public Access Policy page on this guide.

The basics follow:

PUBLICATIONS

All peer-reviewed scholarly publications (research articles, but also "may include" book chapters, editorials and conference proceedings) resulting from federally funded research.

"Freely available and publicly accessible by default in agency-designated repositories without any embargo or delay after publication."

Plans should describe how they'll do this, and how to "maximize equitable reach of public access," suggesting machine-readable formats for assistive devices.

DATA

All the above apply to scientific data underlying these scholarly publications, with certain exceptions for sensitive or legally restricted cases.

Memo says go further with "approaches and timelines" for other federally funded scientific data unassociated w/ scholarly publications.

Make sure repositories align with National Science and Technology Council "Desireable Characteristics of Data Repositories" document.

AND

Researchers need to be responsible for a data management/sharing plan, including the specific repository they intend to submit to.

Researchers can charge the costs of the above (read "Data APC") to their grants.