This proposal focuses on conducting a feasibility study for the institution of an open access National Science Foundation (NSF) publication repository. Specifically, the Johns Hopkins University, in conjunction with the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) and the University of Michigan (UM) will evaluate the technical, policy, and business implications of several approaches that range in options from developing a new system to adopting and customizing distributed technologies to federating a network of institutional repositories. The outcome of this feasibility study will help to better characterize and inform decision makers on the relative strengths and weaknesses for both the technological and economic dimensions characterizing current dialogues on the subject and to further address lingering questions, community wide, about the functional nature and designs for future open access repositories. This feasibility study will similarly address a challenging set of activities pertaining to the integration of traditionally shared data and open-source electronic publishing systems through shared stewardship and infrastructure architectures.
