Aalto University's open access policy for research infrastructures

Aalto University hosts several state-of-the-art physical and digital research and teaching infrastructures, designated Aalto Significant Research Infrastructures¹ (RIs), many of which are unique on the national and European level. These are invaluable tools for state-of-the-art research, education, and innovation.

Aalto’s Significant Research Infrastructures provide non-discriminatory open access for academics regardless of their parent institution, industry, and other actors. However, there are some limitations:

• Aalto University reserves the right to prioritize internal use for research and education over external use.
• Commercial use of select RIs cannot exceed 20% of all available hours per year. Commercial use of some facilities or equipment may be limited if they have been imported free of duties for the purpose of scientific research and education.
• RIs where internal use is close to 100% may not be available to external users.
• Some RIs are available to external users only through collaborative research projects.
• Aalto University reserves the right to limit access to an RI or an individual device due to existing contract and license agreements, responsible international relations (including export control and sanctions regulations), and comparable reasons.

Aalto University’s RIs are available to all approved users at market prices. Academic users² who carry out publicly funded, non-economic activities may be entitled to at-cost pricing. Pricing information is available from individual RIs.

IPR and data policy:

• Aalto University does not claim ownership of the data or other intellectual property produced by external users at our RIs, unless an existing agreement states otherwise.
• Aalto University does not provide a long-term data repository for external users. 
• Aalto University expects all external RI users to follow the applicable laws and data policies of their home organisations and encourages all users to make the data as open and FAIR³ as possible.
• Users of Aalto University’s RIs are requested to appropriately acknowledge their use in the acknowledgement section of their published work and datasets. Preferred forms of acknowledgement are available from RI contact persons.

Prerequisite for access is RI and device specific training. Details on the training requirements, schedules etc. are available from RIs’ staff. Contact information can be found on RIs’ web pages¹.

• Some RIs offer ‘measurement as a service’.
• Some RIs may require an agreement between the RI and external user’s home organization.
• Some RIs may grant access to resources based on the potential user’s research plan, evaluated by an internal board of the RI.

¹  https://www.aalto.fi/en/research-and-learning-infrastructures 
²  Academic users are research organisations as defined in applicable EU state aid regulations and individuals affiliated with these organisations.
³  FAIR Principles - GO FAIR (go-fair.org)

This policy was approved by the strategic management team for Aalto University's significant research infrastructures on 2023-08-25.