The research was funded by a sponsor pursuant to a grant or sponsored research agreement or is subject to a Material Transfer Agreement (MTA), Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA), or other legal obligation that restricts ownership of intellectual property.

In order to permit UI to comply with public access mandates established by federal law or federal agency or university policy (e.g. the National Institutes of Health Public Access Policy, Division G, Title II, Section 218 of PL 110-161 [Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2008]) and related  terms and conditions of research agreements, UI employees and students accepting research grants or contracts from, and conducting research from United States federal  agencies do hereby grant UI an irrevocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-commercial, royalty-free license in copyrightable materials produced as a result of such research, such license to be used solely to comply with public access mandates.  This grant of non-exclusive license is deemed by UI to be a special arrangement for federal grants and contracts, per Subsection E below, and is not subject to the disposition of rights described in B-2-b or to negotiation under Section B-5 below. [add. 7-09, ed. 7-16]   

In cases where a copyrightable work has been produced with support to Northwestern University from a government agency or other external source whose grant specifies that the copyright for any work created under the grant is the property of the University (as grantee), then, if permitted under the applicable grant terms, the University assigns the copyright ownership to the work to the creator(s), subject to the following conditions:

If a faculty member’s work is subject to a contractual obligation of the University, such as a sponsored research agreement, then the ownership of the copyrights with respect to such work shall be governed by the terms of the contractual obligation of the University

Use of any materials or services paid for out of an external grant to the faculty member does not count toward substantial use.

Note that many students are employed or paid by the University in some capacity—often as graduate students under a sponsored research project or department- or faculty-controlled funding. Any such students will be treated the same way as faculty and other University employees for the purposes of this Policy and the ABOR IP Policy with respect to the paid work they perform. Students may be requested to grant rights in Student Works to ABOR or others as a condition of having access to certain class projects, research projects, collaborations, or other programs of the University.

All Intellectual Property that is created by Covered Individuals in the course of performing research projects that are supported partially or fully by the University or any external agency (usually either a private company or a federal agency, in either case referred to as a “sponsor”) is ABOR-Owned IP, regardless of the form or type of Intellectual Property. Sometimes ABOR agrees to grant the sponsor certain ownership and/or license rights in such ABOR-Owned IP. If that is the case, that agreement governs Intellectual Property ownership. The University works with the principal investigator of such a research project when negotiating these agreements with sponsors.