[The subject repositories of strategy of the Open Access initiative]

The subject repositories are defined as a set of digital objects resulting from the research related to a specific disciplinary field and occupy a still restricted space in the discussion agenda of the Free Access Movement when compared to amplitude reached in the discussion of Institutional Repositories. Although the Subject Repository comes to prominence in the field, especially for the success of initiatives such as the arXiv, PubMed and E-prints, the literature on the subject is recognized as very limited. Despite its roots in the Library and Information Science, and focus on the management of disciplinary collections (subject area literature), there is little information available about the development and management of subject repositories. The following text seeks to make a brief summary on the topic as a way to present the potential to develop subject repositories in order to strengthen the initiative of open access.