Last week, the open-access.network project received the sad news that Irene Barbers, Head of the Literature Acquisition Department in the Central Library at Forschungszentrum Jülich, was killed in a road accident.
Among other things, she was most recently responsible for the further development and operation of the Open Access Monitor Germany and for monitoring the DFG funding programme Open Access Publication Costs, carried out by Forschungszentrum Jülich on behalf of the DFG. She was also part of the Transform2Open project team.
We are deeply saddened by the death of Irene. We and the open access community will sorely miss her professional expertise, her great willingness to help and her warm-hearted nature. Irene Barbers provided our project with her advice and support and was a highly valued member of the Information Budget Focus Group, which she co-founded. Our deepest sympathy goes out to her family, friends and colleagues.