My Bibliography FAQ

Questions about Compliance?

I. How do I add and maintain citations in My Bibliography?

1. Entering publications into My Bibliography

2. Other ways citations can appear in My Bibliography

3. Deleting duplicate citations

4. Deleting unwanted citations

5. Linking citations to NIHMSIDs

6. Linking citations to PMIDs

7. Manage public access compliance for citations not written by me

II. How do I set public access compliance statuses and interpret status symbols?

1. Viewing compliance status indicators

2. Meaning of the award display symbols

3. Why papers submitted to the NIHMS are non-compliant in My Bibliography

4. Declaring papers not applicable (N/A) under the NIH public access policy

5. Designating an article as Submission Method B

6. Designating an in-press journal article as submission Method A

III. How do I associate awards with citations?

1. Associating awards with a paper in My Bibliography

2. Associating awards with a paper in My Bibliography when it is already acknowledged in the text

3. Change the awards associated to a citation

4. Associating citations with complex grants

5. Finding the contact PI for a complex grant

6. Generating the PDF compliance report

7. Papers in My NCBI do not appear in my RPPR

IV. Additional tools and information

I. How do I add and maintain citations in My Bibliography?

1. How do I get my publications into My Bibliography?

  1. Sign into your eRA Commons linked My NCBI account here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/account/
  2. For those publications that have citations in PubMed, search by author name in PubMed and use the Send function to import them into My Bibliography.
    • Note 1: Full author name search may not always be comprehensive, so you may try last name, followed by initials.
    • Note 2: If you do not select citations using the check boxes, all of the citations from a search will be sent to your Bibliography.
  3. If a publication is not cited in PubMed (or is in press), you can create the citation manually or upload citations from a .RIS file.

2. How did this citation appear in My Bibliography? I didn't write it and I didn't add it to My Bibliography.

  1. When another author associates their citation in their Bibliography or the NIHMS system with your award, that citation will appear in your Bibliography automatically. This will make reporting and tracking the compliance status for all citations associated with your award easier. A notification will appear in your Bibliography any time a new citation is added in this way. If you would like to keep citations you have not authored separate, you can select them click “Manage citations” and select “Set to private”. The private label has the same reporting and compliance monitoring functions as all citations within My Bibliography.
  2. You can also filter the view of your Bibliography to see only private citations, public citations, citations associated with a particular award, or a combination of those.

3. I have more than one citation for a publication in My Bibliography. How do I delete a duplicate?

  1. Collapsing two citations into one is usually easier than deleting one of the duplicate citations. To collapse duplicates, check to see if one of the duplicates has a PubMed ID (PMID).
    1. Access your My Bibliography and use the Award display setting.
    2. 2. Locate the PubMed citation and copy its PMID number.
    3. Locate the corresponding manully-entered citation, recognizable by the pencil icon beneath the compliance status. Image 02
    4. Click on the pencil icon to enable editing.
    5. In the resulting form, enter the PMID number in the available Unique ID field and select PMID from the Type field. You can ignore the rest of the fields. Based on the PMID number, the system will be able to match and remove the duplicate and also transfer all of the grant associations from the manual citation. Image 03

  2. To collapse manually entered duplicates (where you have no PMID) edit all fields in the editing form so that they are identical between the duplicate citations and the system will be able to recognize and collapse the duplicates.

  3. If you have two PMIDs for two citations, and you are sure that the two citations are the same, click “Write to the Help Desk” near the bottom of My Bibliography.

  4. If you have duplicates where each member has a different NIHMS number, contact the NIHMS help desk through their web form accessible at http://www.nihms.nih.gov/ to have one of the submitted manuscripts removed.

4. I have an unwanted locked citation associated with my award, how do I delete it?

Generally, papers can be disassociated from a grant in the PI's My Bibliography account. You can check there to see if a lock (padlock) is next to the award. If there is no lock, click “Add or delete award” and unselect the award in question. If that does not work, follow the general guidelines in the My NCBI help guide on deleting citations. View your citation in the award display setting and check for locks. Scroll over the lock for an explanation: a silver lock () indicates that award was officially reported on a progress report (RPPR) via eRA Commons. A gold lock () indicates that the award was associated with the publication through NIHMS. For assistance with deleting a citation with a silver lock, please email your request to the Public Access Support Center at PublicAccess@nih.gov . To expedite your request, please include the following in your communication to the Public Access Support Center:

  • PI name/PI email address
  • Full award number, for example, 5R01DKxxxxxx-xx
  • Complete citation(s) to be removed/disassociated. Include the NIHMSID, PMID, and PMCID if assigned.
  • Reason for the disassociation. Non-compliance is not a valid reason.

Important: eRA Commons will notify you when the lock is removed so you may move or delete the citation.

5. How do I link a citation to an NIHMSID?

  1. In the award view, activate the pop-up wizard by clicking either a hollow dot, red dot, question mark or use the search box to filter/locate the citation.

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  1. Click the “Edit Status” link beneath the compliance status.

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  1. You will be guided by a dialog, which will allow you to enter the NIHMSID.

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Be sure to save your changes to close the window.

6. Linking in press citations with a PubMed identifier (PMID)

  1. Linking citations to PMIDs automatically through My NCBI alerts.
    1. The My NCBI tool often recognizes and removes duplicate citations automatically. It also matches PubMed citations with manual citations and it alerts users about possible duplicates. To resolve the alert, follow its link in My Bibliography.
    2. The links opens up a wizard where you can select the option to merge the manually-entered citation with a PubMed citation:
  2. Automatic recognition or the merge may not succeed if the manual citation markedly differs from the PubMed citation. To link citations with a PMID manually:
    1. Locate the corresponding manually-entered citation, recognizable by the pencil icon beneath the compliance status.
    2. Click on the pencil icon to enable editing.
    3. In the resulting form, enter the PMID number in the available Unique ID field and select PMID in the Type field. You can ignore the rest of the fields. Based on the PMID number, the system will be able to match and remove the duplicate and transfer all of the grant associations from the manual citation.

7. How can I manage the citations in My Bibliography that were not written by me and appear in my collection?

In most cases, the citations have been added to My Bibliography because they are affiliated with an award you own. Many investigators use the private label to track papers that they did not author but were directly supported by their NIH funds. Additional information can be found in Viewing Citations and Making Citations Private (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK53595/#mybibliography.Viewing_Citations_and_Mak)

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II. How do I set public access compliance statuses and interpret status symbols?

1. I don't see any compliance status indicators in My Bibliography. What should I do?

  1. Make sure your NCBI account is linked to your eRA Commons account. See the “Checking your Publication Compliance Status” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK53595/#mybibliography.Checking_your_Publication) in the My NCBI help guide.
  2. Second, change your display settings to “Award view” as described in the My NCBI help guide.

2. What is the meaning of the symbols in the award display settings?

Please review the My NCBI help guide on managing compliance.

3. My manuscript has been submitted through the NIHMS and the citation in My Bibliography shows the NIHMSID. Why is this citation still marked as non-compliant and not in progress in My Bibliography?

The citation is marked non-compliant if a PMCID is not assigned within three months of publication. You are required to submit your manuscript to NIHMS immediately upon acceptance for publication.

4. How do I switch a citation to N/A (not applicable)?

  1. The NIH public access policy only applies to peer-reviewed journal articles that were accepted for publication as of April 7, 2008, and directly arise from NIH funds active as of Fiscal Year 2008 and beyond. See http://publicaccess.nih.gov/determine-applicability.htm for full criteria. Publications entered into My NCBI in the non-journal article citation formats will be automatically marked as exempt from public access (not applicable).
  2. You can designate a journal article as not applicable by selecting the “Edit Status” link to the right of the citation.

  1. You will be guided by a dialogue. From there, you can indicate if the journal article is: not directly supported by NIH funds; accepted for publication prior to April 7 2008; not published in a Latin alphabet; not peer-reviewed. Any of these choices will designate the paper as N/A.

Dialogue to select N/A status

Be sure to save your changes to close the window.

Note, N/A status is particular to each My NCBI account, and does not transfer to collaborators. Therefore, each PI will have to declare N/A status themselves.

5. How do I designate a journal article as submission Method B?

  1. Some authors make arrangements with a publisher to deposit the final published version of an article directly in PMC; this usually involves choosing the publisher's fee-based open access option for publishing that article. A list of publisher programs that deposit using Method B is available at http://publicaccess.nih.gov/select_deposit_publishers.htm.
  2. To list a citation as Method B, use the “Edit Status” link by the citation and select that it was funded by NIH. The form will expand, allowing you to choose the proper response. Note: do not submit the manuscript to NIHMS yourself as this will result in duplicates and processing delay.

Dialogue to select submission method B

6. How do I designate an in-press journal article as submission Method A?

  1. Some journals automatically submit the final published article to PubMed Central. These journals are listed at http://publicaccess.nih.gov/submit_process_journals.htm. These papers display in the My Bibliography award view as provisionally compliant (PMC Journal In Process) until a PMCID is issued.
  2. To list a citation as Method A, you must enter the journal title using the autosuggest selection.
  3. Manually typed journal titles will not be recognized as Method A. To correct a manual citation that is not displaying as such:
    1. Access your My Bibliography and use the Award display setting.
    2. Locate the corresponding manually-entered citation, recognizable by the pencil icon beneath the compliance status, and click ‘Edit Citation' it to correct the journal title.

Note, this citation would display as non-compliant with the public access policy if it was linked to an NIH award.

  1. Re-enter the Journal title and select from the autosuggest box

  1. The paper will now display as provisionally compliant under method A (PMC Journal- In Process) when the award is added

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III. How do I associate awards with citations?

1. How do I associate an award with a citation in My Bibliography?

  1. An award association made in NIHMS will appear automatically in My Bibliography with a gold lock.
  2. To manually associate an award with a citation in My Bibliography, follow the steps in the My NCBI help guide.
  3. Reporting a paper on an NIH progress report associates the paper with that award. The association will appear with a silver lock in My Bibliography and cannot be deleted without permission from the funding NIH Institute or Center.

2. All of the awards that supported this research paper are listed in the paper itself. Do I need to do anything else?

Yes. My Bibliography will not harvest award information from the text of your paper or indexing services. You will need to associate the awards that supported your research with your citations in My Bibliography.

3. This award did not support this research. What do I do?

  1. First, check to see if there is a lock symbol next to the award. If there is no lock, click “Add or delete award” and unselect the award in question.
  2. If the award is locked by a gold lock, contact the NIHMS Help Desk through their web form accessible at http://www.nihms.nih.gov/ to have the erroneous association removed. When you contact NIHMS, include the following details: the award number, the NIHMSID, the PMID (if available), and your eRA Commons username. Once the lock is removed, you can remove the award association by clicking “Add or delete award.”
  3. If the award is locked by a silver lock, you will have to electronically revise the progress report where the association is made. Email the Public Access Policy group at PublicAccess@nih.gov to have this officially reported erroneous association resolved. Include the award number, the citation information, including PMID, and your eRA Commons username. Once the lock is removed, you will be able to remove the grant association by clicking “Add or delete award.”
  4. If you did not author the publication, and none of your awards supported the research, only remove the locks from awards for which you are responsible. Once the locks have been removed, delete associations to your awards, and then you can delete the citation from your Bibliography.

4. How are complex grants entered in My Bibliography?

A complex grant consists of a main project and several sub-projects. The main project is also known as the parent project, while the sub-projects are also known as children, components, or core projects. The authors should add the award for the parent project, and can add component projects if they wish. To add the award for the main project you have to know the contact PI (overall award owner). In My Bibliography select “add or delete award” and then search with the project number. From the list of PIs, locate the contact PI and select the award under his/her name. If you do not know the name of the contact PI see "Finding the contact PI for a complex grant".

5. How do I find the contact PI (overall award owner) for the main award where the main award has several components?

Search the NIH Reporter or ask your grants management office. Search the Reporter with the main award number. The search will result in a table that will include the main award number and also sub-award numbers. The sub-award number will be missing in the entry for the contact PI of the main award.

6. How do I generate a PDF Compliance Report?

Follow this section in the My NCBI Help guide.

7. I do not see papers I entered in My NCBI listed on my RPPR. How do I enter them on to my RPPR?

  1. Confirm your My NCBI account is linked to the correct eRA commons account where you are preparing the RPPR. In My Bibliography, click on your username on the NCBI header to access the Account Settings page. Ensure the correct eRA Commons account is listed. If not, see Linking eRA Commons accounts to My NCBI.
  2. Ensure all the papers you wish to report are linked to the award in My Bibliography. See Associating awards with a paper in My Bibliography for instructions.
  3. Full documentation on the RPPR is also available.

IV. Where do I find information about other sites/tools concerning compliance with the Public Access Policy?

  • For topics related to manuscript submissions refer to the NIHMS site: http://www.nihms.nih.gov/. Use the contact form on the web page for your inquiries.
  • For monitoring institutional compliance, refer to the Public Access Compliance Monitor. For an overview of the Compliance monitor, consult their user guide. Please direct all questions concerning the Public Access Compliance Monitor to the helpdesk at PublicAccess@nih.gov
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