Open Access Week: Explore OpenBU

October 27th, 2023

The BU Libraries are celebrating International Open Access Week (October 23-29) by highlighting library services that support the global reach of scholarship produced at BU and by sharing the variety of works available in BU’s digital institutional repository.

To support the university’s commitment to “disseminating the fruits of its research and scholarship as widely as possible” as outlined in its open access policy, the BU Libraries manages a digital institutional repository OpenBU (open.bu.edu), available to all members of the university community. As BU’s digital institutional repository, OpenBU houses thousands of articles, chapters, theses and dissertations, presentations, datasets, media, and more—all authored or co-authored by BU faculty, students, and staff. This repository enables BU researchers to share, disseminate, and preserve their scholarship, and makes their research more accessible.

Learn how to contribute your own work to OpenBU and share it with the world.

OpenBU currently holds 44,428 items, and since its launch, there have been 6,466,630 downloads and  7,867,607 views of its items. Its collections cover a wide array of topics, and materials from numerous BU colleges, schools, and departments can be found in the repository. The scope of the repository’s materials is captured in OpenBU’s most-viewed items of the past year:

Item Title	Collection	Item Views	Item Downloads
The concept of the soul in Plato and in early Judeo-Christian thought	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	19,059	559
Robert Frost: His treatment of nature and humanity	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	10,337	231
The supernatural in the poetry of Samuel Taylor Coleridge	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	8,212	130
The influence of the Sexual Harassment and Assault Response and Prevention Program on norms and society in the United States Army	CAS: Political Science: Undergraduate Honors Theses	7,789	427
Spinoza’s concept of God’s infinity	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	6,644	238
Igbesi Aiye Chief Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti (The life and times of Chief Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti)	Gender in Yoruba Anjemi Manuscripts, Images, and Interviews	6,526	82
Jean-Paul Sartre’s concept of freedom.	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	5,696	362
Abraham Lincoln and Christianity.	Dissertations and Theses (pre-1964)	5,525	90
Effectiveness of various cleaning agents at removing detectable traces of blood	Boston University Theses & Dissertations	5,280	513
Evaluating the vitamin D content in sardines and mackerel	Boston University Theses & Dissertations	4,237	50

This list offers a small snapshot of the wealth of materials researchers can share and discover through OpenBU. This repository is a key program in the BU Libraries’ broad support of research, teaching, and learning at Boston University and it is part of BU Libraries’ deep commitment to facilitating greater access to research and knowledge.

Explore the benefits of this open access initiative by browsing OpenBU’s collections and contributing your own work. If you have questions about contributing to or exploring OpenBU, email open-help@bu.edu.