MCP OpenAlex

An MCP (Model Context Protocol) server that provides access to the OpenAlex API for scholarly publications and research data.

Features

• 🔍 Search scholarly works, authors, institutions, and sources
• 📚 Access detailed metadata for academic publications
• 👥 Explore author profiles and publication histories
• 🏛️ Browse institutional research outputs
• 📰 Discover academic journals and sources
• 🔓 No API key required (optional polite pool access with email)
• 🚀 Built with TypeScript for type safety

Available Tools

Works (Publications)

• search_works: Search for scholarly publications with filters
• get_work: Get detailed information about a specific work

Authors

• search_authors: Search for researchers and authors
• get_author: Get detailed author profiles including metrics and affiliations

Institutions

• search_institutions: Search for universities and research organizations

Sources (Journals)

• search_sources: Search for journals, conferences, and repositories

Installation

Using npx (recommended)

npx mcp-openalex

Global Installation

npm install -g mcp-openalex

Local Development

git clone https://github.com/Mearman/mcp-openalex.git
cd mcp-openalex
yarn install
yarn build

Configuration

Claude Desktop

Add to your claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "openalex": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["mcp-openalex"],
      "env": {}
    }
  }
}

For local development:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "openalex": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/path/to/mcp-openalex/dist/index.js"],
      "env": {}
    }
  }
}

Usage Examples

Search for Works

search_works
- search: "machine learning"
- filter: "publication_year:2023"
- sort: "cited_by_count:desc"
- per_page: 10

Get Work Details

get_work
- id: "W2741809807"

Search for Authors

search_authors
- search: "Geoffrey Hinton"
- filter: "works_count:>100"

Get Author Profile

get_author
- id: "A2698986125"

Search Institutions

search_institutions
- search: "MIT"
- filter: "country_code:US"

Search Sources

search_sources
- search: "Nature"
- filter: "is_oa:true"

Tool Parameters

Common Parameters

• mailto: (optional) Email address for polite pool access and higher rate limits
• page: Page number for pagination (default: 1)
• per_page: Results per page, max 200 (default: 25)

Search Parameters

• search: Free-text search query
• filter: OpenAlex filter expressions (e.g., "publication_year:2023")
• sort: Sort field and direction (e.g., "cited_by_count:desc")

Rate Limits

• Standard: 100,000 requests per day, 10 requests per second
• Polite pool (with email): Higher limits available
• Returns HTTP 429 when rate limited

OpenAlex API

This MCP server interfaces with the OpenAlex API, a free and open database of scholarly metadata. No authentication is required, but providing an email address enables "polite pool" access with better rate limits.

Development

# Install dependencies
yarn install

# Run in development mode
yarn dev

# Build for production
yarn build

# Run tests
yarn test

# Lint and format
yarn lint
yarn format

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

License

CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 © Joseph Mearman

Acknowledgments

Built using the MCP TypeScript SDK and powered by OpenAlex.