Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA), mostly commonly referred to as PNAS, is the official publication of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. It is a biweekly journal of all sciences, with a particular focus on the biological sciences. It is notable for its policy of making the full text of the articles freely available to all 6 months after the original publication date, conforming with the "open access" policy proposed by the Public Library of Science. Immediate full-text access (without the 6-month delay) is available in more than 130 developing countries.

Members of the National Academy, all of whom have distinguished themselves as scientists, may publish research reports in PNAS without peer review. Members may also "sponsor" reports of research in which they did not participate and of which reports they are not named as authors. These sponsored articles are not peer reviewed either. The sponsorship policy has provoked criticism by scientists, not least from Academy members. Critics objected to the policy both in principle and because it had led, they argued, to a lending of the Academy imprimatur to weak or faulty studies, which did not deserve publication in a premier journal. In the past, sponsored articles were not identified as such, but the journal recently began doing so.

External links

• http://www.pnas.org/ -- website for PNAS