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Agent skill

Semantic Scholar Database

by aipoch in aipoch/medical-research-skills

Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration.

MITAuto-check passedResearch & Science

Install Semantic Scholar Database

skills CLI
$ npx skills add aipoch/medical-research-skills --skill semantic-scholar-database -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install aipoch/medical-research-skills semantic-scholar-database --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/aipoch/medical-research-skills.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/'scientific-skills/Evidence Insight/semantic-scholar-database' .claude/skills/semantic-scholar-database && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
semantic-scholar-database
GitHub stars
2k
Token cost
~1k tokens
SKILL.md length
282 words
Files
4 (incl. scripts, references)
Skills in repo
567
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
MIT

At a glance

Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration.

  • Tasks that involve Academic paper search
  • SKILL.md covers When to Use, Key Features, Dependencies and Example Usage, plus 1 more section
  • Runs Python scripts from its folder; reaches api.semanticscholar.org; needs S2_API_KEY
  • Tasks that involve Citation management

What it does

Semantic Scholar Database is an agent skill from aipoch/medical-research-skills. Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration.

Its SKILL.md is about 1k tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. The skill folder holds 5 other files, including scripts and reference files (for example `references/api_docs.md`, `scripts/client.py` and `semantic-scholar-database_audit_result_v1.json`).

It sits in Research & Science, covering Academic paper search and Citation management. It works with Semantic Scholar. The repository describes itself as: Hundreds of agent skills for medical research, including protocol design, data analysis, evidence insights, and academic writing. The licence is MIT.

When your agent uses it

  • Tasks that involve Academic paper search
  • Tasks that involve Citation management

Example prompts

  • “/semantic-scholar-database”

Requirements

  • Python 3
  • A credential in S2_API_KEY
  • A credential in YOUR_API_KEY

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 686e09d. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    Ships 1 file in scripts/ (Python), which the agent can run.

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    Hosts in commands or code, which the agent is likely to contact:

    • api.semanticscholar.org

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names these keys or tokens, usually read from environment variables:

    • S2_API_KEY

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Semantic Scholar Database loads about 1k tokens when it runs, and up to ~1.2k if it reads all its reference files. Until then it costs about 47 tokens; SKILL.md has 282 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~47
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~1k
With references · SKILL.md plus every file in references/, read only if the agent opens them
~1.2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); the scripts in this folder are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from aipoch/medical-research-skills at commit 686e09d, republished under its MIT licence (© aipoch). 282 words, ~1,036 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/semantic-scholar-database/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder). This skill also uses 3 other files; get the full folder from GitHub.
name
semantic-scholar-database
description
Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration.
license
MIT
author
AIPOCH

Source: https://github.com/aipoch/medical-research-skills

When to Use

  • You need to find relevant papers by keyword, title, or known identifiers (e.g., Semantic Scholar Paper ID).
  • You want to fetch detailed metadata for a paper (abstract, venue, year, fields of study, etc.).
  • You need author-centric information such as an author profile and their publications.
  • You want to explore a citation network by traversing references or citations for a given paper.
  • You are building a literature review workflow that requires programmatic access to scholarly graph data.

Key Features

  • Paper search via the Semantic Scholar Graph API.
  • Paper details retrieval (e.g., abstract, venue, citations-related fields depending on requested fields).
  • Author details retrieval (author profile and associated papers depending on requested fields).
  • Citation graph traversal:
    • Fetch papers that cite a target paper (citations)
    • Fetch papers referenced by a target paper (references)
  • Optional API key support for higher rate limits via environment variable.

Dependencies

  • Python >=3.9
  • requests >=2.25.0

Example Usage

python
import os
from scripts.client import (
    search_papers,
    get_paper_details,
    get_author_details,
    get_citations,
)

# Optional: set for higher rate limits
# os.environ["S2_API_KEY"] = "YOUR_API_KEY"

def main():
    # 1) Search papers
    results = search_papers(query="Attention Is All You Need", limit=5)
    print("Search results (top 5):")
    for i, p in enumerate(results, 1):
        # The exact keys depend on the fields requested by the client implementation.
        print(f"{i}. {p.get('title')} ({p.get('year')}) - paperId={p.get('paperId')}")

    # 2) Get paper details
    paper_id = "649def34f8be52c8b66281af98ae884c09aef38b"
    paper = get_paper_details(paper_id=paper_id)
    print("\nPaper details:")
    print("Title:", paper.get("title"))
    print("Venue:", paper.get("venue"))
    print("Year:", paper.get("year"))
    print("Abstract:", (paper.get("abstract") or "")[:300], "...")

    # 3) Get author details
    author_id = "1741101"
    author = get_author_details(author_id=author_id)
    print("\nAuthor details:")
    print("Name:", author.get("name"))
    print("AuthorId:", author.get("authorId"))

    # 4) Traverse citations / references
    citing = get_citations(paper_id=paper_id, method="citations")
    refs = get_citations(paper_id=paper_id, method="references")
    print("\nCitation traversal:")
    print("Citations count:", len(citing) if isinstance(citing, list) else "N/A")
    print("References count:", len(refs) if isinstance(refs, list) else "N/A")

if __name__ == "__main__":
    main()

Implementation Details

  • API Endpoint: The skill communicates with the Semantic Scholar Graph API:
    • Base URL: https://api.semanticscholar.org/graph/v1/
  • HTTP Client: Uses requests to perform REST calls.
  • Authentication / Rate Limits:
    • If S2_API_KEY is set in the environment, requests should include it (typically via an x-api-key header) to obtain higher rate limits.
    • Without an API key, the API may enforce stricter rate limiting.
  • Core Operations (as implemented in scripts/client.py):
    • search_papers(query, limit=...): queries the search endpoint and returns a list of matching papers.
    • get_paper_details(paper_id): fetches metadata for a specific paper ID.
    • get_author_details(author_id): fetches metadata for a specific author ID.
    • get_citations(paper_id, method="citations"|"references"): traverses the citation graph by selecting either inbound citations or outbound references.
  • Parameters:
    • limit: controls the maximum number of results returned by search.
    • method: must be either "citations" or "references" to select traversal direction.

© aipoch, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

SKILL.md and 3 other files (scripts, references) in scientific-skills/Evidence Insight/semantic-scholar-database of aipoch/medical-research-skills.

  • SKILL.md
  • references/api_docs.md
  • scripts/client.py
  • semantic-scholar-database_audit_result_v1.json

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 686e09d

Compare with similar skills

Semantic Scholar Database next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Semantic Scholar Database compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Semantic Scholar Database this skillaipoch/medical-research-skills2k—~1kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Literature Reviewneflibata-feng/MyArxiv-Agent12621 repos~5.9kAutomated safety check: NotesMIT
Paper Research on arXivXiaomiMiMo/MiMo-Code14k1 repos~1.5kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Literature Review AgentAr9av/PaperOrchestra6772 repos~5.2kAutomated safety check: PassCustom licence
Paper AutoratersAr9av/PaperOrchestra6772 repos~1.6kAutomated safety check: PassCustom licence
Deep Research Literature SurveyHKUSTDial/Supervisor-Skills8.5k—~2.4kAutomated safety check: PassCC-BY-NC-SA-4.0

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Works with

Categories

Questions about Semantic Scholar Database

What does Semantic Scholar Database do?

Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration. Semantic Scholar Database is an agent skill from aipoch/medical-research-skills. Access the Semantic Scholar Graph API to search papers and retrieve paper/author/citation data when you need literature discovery or citation graph exploration.

When should I use Semantic Scholar Database?

Semantic Scholar Database fits situations like: tasks that involve Academic paper search; tasks that involve Citation management.

How do I install Semantic Scholar Database in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add aipoch/medical-research-skills --skill semantic-scholar-database -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (scientific-skills/Evidence Insight/semantic-scholar-database in aipoch/medical-research-skills) into .claude/skills/semantic-scholar-database in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Semantic Scholar Database in Codex?

Run `npx skills add aipoch/medical-research-skills --skill semantic-scholar-database -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (scientific-skills/Evidence Insight/semantic-scholar-database in aipoch/medical-research-skills) into .agents/skills/semantic-scholar-database in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Semantic Scholar Database in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add aipoch/medical-research-skills --skill semantic-scholar-database -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/semantic-scholar-database, .gemini/skills/semantic-scholar-database, .github/skills/semantic-scholar-database and .opencode/skills/semantic-scholar-database in your project.

What does Semantic Scholar Database need to run?

Going by SKILL.md and its folder, Semantic Scholar Database needs Python for the scripts in its folder and credentials named S2_API_KEY. Our summary lists: Python 3; A credential in S2_API_KEY; A credential in YOUR_API_KEY.

Does Semantic Scholar Database access the network?

SKILL.md names 1 domain. In commands or code: api.semanticscholar.org; the agent is likely to contact it when it follows the instructions. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Semantic Scholar Database safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. The check reads SKILL.md only: the scripts in the folder are not scanned, so read them before running anything.

What licence does Semantic Scholar Database use?

Semantic Scholar Database is published under the MIT licence (declared in SKILL.md). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Semantic Scholar Database use?

About 1k tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 4.1k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full. Its references folder adds about 135 tokens, read only when the agent opens those files.

What are the alternatives to Semantic Scholar Database?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Semantic Scholar Database: Literature Review (neflibata-feng/MyArxiv-Agent, 126 stars), Paper Research on arXiv (XiaomiMiMo/MiMo-Code, 14k stars), Literature Review Agent (Ar9av/PaperOrchestra, 677 stars) and Paper Autoraters (Ar9av/PaperOrchestra, 677 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Semantic Scholar Database?

aipoch (a GitHub organization) maintains it in aipoch/medical-research-skills, which has 1,974 GitHub stars. The repository holds 567 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on September 17, 2026.

Source: aipoch/medical-research-skills on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.