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 systems.” In 2009, JISC also funded a project to investigate interoperability between repositories and online library catalogues. More recently, it has funded an Open Access Repository Junction “to scope, build and test a deposit broker tool to assist deposit into, and interoperability between, existing repository services.” This is intended to simplify workflows for authors and publishers who wish to deposit material in more than one repository. JISC has also worked on interoperability issues with analogous bodies in Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark through the Knowledge Exchange, which includes an interoperability of digital repositories (IDR) working group.

7.59. The repository metadata landscape remains confusing, however, and the UK repository community in universities does not have a clear understanding of the requirements arising from initiatives such as OpenAIRE, and the Common European Research Project Information Format (CERIF). JISC is therefore working with RCUK and others on guidance to institutional repositories on an enhanced metadata set.

Subject repositories

7.60. The issues for subject-based repositories tend to be rather different. They have had a significant impact in a number of subject areas including physics (through ArXiv), and the life sciences and medicine (through PubMedCentral and UKPMC). The most successful repositories have been able to develop good search and navigation facilities, but these remain a challenge for others that have fewer financial resources to invest in such services. Overall there remain many gaps in the provision of subject-based repositories; many subject areas lack them entirely, or have only small-scale repositories which have not reached the critical mass to make them effective routes to access for more than a relatively small band of enthusiasts.

7.61. It is important, moreover, to note the characteristics of the most successful repositories. In physics, ArXiv operates in the main as a pre-print repository, where researchers deposit and gain access to draft papers before they are submitted to journals for peer review and publication. The repository and the journals thus co-exist, each with their distinctive roles. In medical and biological sciences, PubMedCentral and UKPMC have been established by the major research funding agencies in their domain in the UK and the US as key mechanisms to support their access policies; and for the funders of UKPMC, that service sits alongside their support for open access publishing. Again, the repository operates in tandem with