autocomplete_authors
Enhanced autocomplete authors with intelligent filtering and ranking.
LABSCO SUMMARY
Disambiguation first, bibliography second.
Most bibliographic servers hand back one best match and leave you to hope it is the right person. This one returns several candidates side by side with the institution and citation numbers that actually separate them, which is the step that goes wrong when a common name has a career spanning two labs. Affiliations come back with the years attached, so a move between institutions reads off the record instead of being inferred.
What it is
An MCP server over the OpenAlex.org API aimed at one hard problem in academic research: deciding which person an author name refers to. It returns ranked candidates with the institutional and citation context needed to pick between them, then retrieves that author's works with filters for year, venue type, open access and retraction status.
What you get
- Multiple ranked candidates for an ambiguous name, each with an institution hint, works count, citation count and an ORCID where one exists, so a match can be chosen on context rather than on spelling —
autocomplete_authors - Author records filtered by institution, research topic or country code, carrying name alternatives, affiliations dated by year, h-index and i10-index —
search_authors - An author's publications with title, DOI, venue, year, citation count and open-access status, filterable by publication year, work type, institution and retraction, ordered by date or by citations —
retrieve_author_works
Requirements
No account and no key: OpenAlex asks only for a contact address, which goes in OPENALEX_MAILTO. Python 3.10 or higher. The package is alex-mcp: a clone of the main branch (version 4.8.2) installs with pip install -e ., while the README's uvx line launches the older 4.1.0 tag straight from the git URL. OPENALEX_MAX_AUTHORS, OPENALEX_RATE_PER_SEC and OPENALEX_RATE_PER_DAY are optional and cap how hard it queries the API.
Setup effort
One command — uvx --from git+https://github.com/drAbreu/alex-mcp.git@4.1.0 alex-mcp
USE CASES
01
Pinning down which researcher a citation means
Ask for candidates on the name plus whatever context you have — a lab, a field, a country — and compare institution hints, works counts and ORCIDs before committing to one OpenAlex ID.
02
Tracing a career across institutions
Pull the author record and read the affiliations with their years attached, which shows where they were and when rather than only where they are now.
03
Building a publication list you can trust
Retrieve works for a confirmed author ID, restricted to journal articles, ordered by citations, with retracted items filtered out and open-access status on every entry.
04
Finding the open-access version of a body of work
Filter an author's works by open-access status and read the DOI and venue for each, so a reading list can be assembled without hitting paywalls.
8 tools
Counted once with only startup setup. Other versions, modes or optional credentials may expose a different list.
get_orcid_publications
Get publications/works from an ORCID profile.
pubmed_author_sample
Get detailed author sample from PubMed with institutional information.
retrieve_author_works
Enhanced MCP tool wrapper for retrieving author works with flexible filtering.
search_authors
Optimized MCP tool wrapper for searching authors.
search_orcid_authors
Search ORCID for author profiles by name and affiliation.
search_pubmed
Search PubMed database for publications.
search_works
Optimized MCP tool wrapper for searching works.
BEFORE YOU INSTALL
What to know first
Tools you get
8 tools when we connected.
Requires
Python 3.10 or later
CONTEXT COST
Light Standing cost
Rated by the size of the 8 tool definitions that ride along on every turn, not by how many there are
INSTALLATION
Connect your client
Server setup
TERMINAL
uvx --from git+https://github.com/drAbreu/alex-mcp.git@4.1.0 alex-mcpMCP Clients
Claude Desktop
CLAUDE DESKTOP · TERMINAL
git clone https://github.com/drAbreu/alex-mcp.git
cd alex-mcp
python3 -m venv venv && source venv/bin/activateWindows: venv\Scripts\activate.
CLAUDE DESKTOP · TERMINAL
pip install -e .Add this block to your Claude Desktop configuration file:
CLAUDE DESKTOP · JSON
{
"mcpServers": {
"alex-mcp": {
"command": "<YOUR_PATH_TO_ALEX_MCP>/run_alex_mcp.sh",
"env": {
"OPENALEX_MAILTO": "<YOUR_OPENALEX_MAILTO>"
}
}
}
}<YOUR_PATH_TO_ALEX_MCP> is the full path to your clone, and <YOUR_OPENALEX_MAILTO> is your own address — OpenAlex uses it as a courtesy contact, it is not a credential.
