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Open and responsible science

Open Science

Erasmus MC actively promotes Open Science to make scientific knowledge freely accessible, reusable, and collaborative—benefiting both science and society. By sharing research early and openly, we foster transparency, accelerate innovation, and enable multidisciplinary collaboration.

UNESCO defines Open Science as an inclusive approach that:

  • Makes multilingual scientific knowledge openly available and reusable for everyone.
  • Enhances collaboration and information sharing for the benefit of science and society.
  • Involves societal actors in the research process.

This includes scientific publications, data, software and source code, educational resources, and more.

Open Access

Open Access ensures free online access to scientific publications without financial, legal, or technical barriers. Erasmus MC supports immediate Open Access because publicly funded research should be publicly available.

Benefits for researchers:

  • Easier reuse of results.
  • Higher citation rates.
  • Greater visibility and impact.
  • Faster dissemination into healthcare and education.

Policy

All short scientific work must be published Open Access—via an Open Access journal or by depositing their work in the institutional repository Pure – at the earliest possible stage in the research cycle.

Taverne Regulation (effective March 10, 2025)

Enables public access to publisher versions of short works after a reasonable embargo via Pure. More info is available on the Medical Library intranet.

Right Retention Strategy (RRS)

RRS enables researchers to retain copyright over their work even if submitted to a subscription journal by allowing them to deposit the Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version of their work Pure with a CC-BY license without an embargo period.

Open Data

Open Data refers to research data - quantitative or qualitative - that is freely available for reuse and distribution under open licenses like Creative Commons.

It also includes research software, such as scripts, tools, and environments (e.g., SPSS, DRE), used in data analysis and processing. Open Data practices support transparency and reproducibility across disciplines.

FAIR data

The FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) go beyond Open Data by ensuring high-quality, well-described, and reusable datasets.

Erasmus MC encourages FAIR practices to align with legal and ethical standards (e.g., GDPR, patents). FAIR data maximizes research impact, supports new discoveries, and improves healthcare outcomes.

Making data FAIR is a mindset - every researcher and department plays a role.

Research Quality

Continual monitoring of the quality of Erasmus MC research and research vision is compulsory as laid down in the Law on Higher Education and Scientific Research (WHW, Article 1.18). The primary aim of research evaluations is to reveal and confirm the quality and relevance of research to society and to improve these where necessary.

The Executive Board (CvB) of the Erasmus University Rotterdam stipulates that research evaluations plus site-visits must be conducted every 6 years following the Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP). This protocol, developed collectively by the VSNU, NWO and KNAW is used by all Dutch universities and UMCs.
 
In 2019 Erasmus MC organized the mandatory six-year research evaluation over the period 2013-2018 according to the Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP).

Available for download

Assessment report from the External committees

Response from the Erasmus MC Executive Board

Download the response

The next SEP will take place in 2025-2026.

Responsible Science

All persons associated with the Erasmus MC, and working in science, have a strict responsibility to adhere to European, national and local professional research codes and practices regarding research integrity and ethics.

Erasmus MC endorses the Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity of the Association of Universities in the Netherlands and the revised European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity. Important principles of ethical research practice are transparency, due care, reliability, verifiability, impartiality and independence of research.

Open Access

Open Access ensures free online access to scientific publications without financial, legal, or technical barriers. Erasmus MC supports immediate Open Access because publicly funded research should be publicly available.

Benefits for researchers:

  • Easier reuse of results.
  • Higher citation rates.
  • Greater visibility and impact.
  • Faster dissemination into healthcare and education.

Policy

All short scientific work must be published Open Access—via an Open Access journal or by depositing their work in the institutional repository Pure – at the earliest possible stage in the research cycle.

Taverne Regulation (effective March 10, 2025)

Enables public access to publisher versions of short works after a reasonable embargo via Pure. More info is available on the Medical Library intranet.

Right Retention Strategy (RRS)

RRS enables researchers to retain copyright over their work even if submitted to a subscription journal by allowing them to deposit the Author Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version of their work Pure with a CC-BY license without an embargo period.

Open Data

Open Data refers to research data - quantitative or qualitative - that is freely available for reuse and distribution under open licenses like Creative Commons.

It also includes research software, such as scripts, tools, and environments (e.g., SPSS, DRE), used in data analysis and processing. Open Data practices support transparency and reproducibility across disciplines.

FAIR data

The FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) go beyond Open Data by ensuring high-quality, well-described, and reusable datasets.

Erasmus MC encourages FAIR practices to align with legal and ethical standards (e.g., GDPR, patents). FAIR data maximizes research impact, supports new discoveries, and improves healthcare outcomes.

Making data FAIR is a mindset - every researcher and department plays a role.

Research Quality

Continual monitoring of the quality of Erasmus MC research and research vision is compulsory as laid down in the Law on Higher Education and Scientific Research (WHW, Article 1.18). The primary aim of research evaluations is to reveal and confirm the quality and relevance of research to society and to improve these where necessary.

The Executive Board (CvB) of the Erasmus University Rotterdam stipulates that research evaluations plus site-visits must be conducted every 6 years following the Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP). This protocol, developed collectively by the VSNU, NWO and KNAW is used by all Dutch universities and UMCs.
 
In 2019 Erasmus MC organized the mandatory six-year research evaluation over the period 2013-2018 according to the Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP).

Available for download

Assessment report from the External committees

Response from the Erasmus MC Executive Board

Download the response

The next SEP will take place in 2025-2026.