Open Science tools for rapid and rigorous publication of research results: The REPO4EU publication platform

Open Science extends the principles of openness and collaboration to the entire scientific process — from hypothesis through experiment and data collection to the communication of results. Open and interoperable systems at each step can increase the speed, breadth, and inclusivity of knowledge generation. Open Science is a policy priority for the European Commission as “it improves the quality, efficiency and responsiveness of research.” [1] The REPO4EU project will, therefore, create a new publishing platform based on Open Science principles. The platform will allow rapid sharing of results as “preprints” with a range of automated checks for scientific rigor and an open and interactive peer review process to provide a transparent and collaborative approach to improving manuscripts. Reproducibility of results will be a central focus. Best practices around the use of persistent identifiers for authors (ORCID), institutes (ROR), funders (FundRef), research materials (RRIDs), and data sets (DOI) will be supported and encouraged, because interoperability with other parts of the Open Science infrastructure is essential for rapid dissemination. New modes of research evaluation metrics will also be explored on the platform. Numerous digital tools and platforms have been developed over the past decade to support researchers, institutes and research projects collaborate openly and effectively. Several of these will be built into the REPO4EU platform. The publishing platform will be based on technology from ScienceOpen and will include integrations with SciScore, Altmetric, ORCID and Crossref among others. With this publishing platform REPO4EU aims to set a new standard for open scientific communication.