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How to connect Semanticscholar to Claude

Connect Claude Web, Desktop and Cowork to Semanticscholar MCP. Find the latest papers on graph neural networks, list citations for a specific research paper, and more using natural language, with authentication handled for you.

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Semantic Scholar is an AI-powered academic search engine for scientific literature. It helps researchers quickly discover, analyze, and understand research papers across disciplines.

20 Tools

Introduction

Claude is Anthropic's AI assistant, available on the web, in the desktop app, and on mobile. Cowork is its agent for knowledge work, and it runs on all of those surfaces too. Connected to your apps, Claude can work with your files and services to accomplish complex tasks on your behalf.

This guide walks you through the easiest and most secure way to connect your Semanticscholar account to Claude via Composio Connect, enabling it to find the latest papers on graph neural networks, list citations for a specific research paper, summarize an author’s recent publications, and more such actions on your behalf without compromising your account security.

Setup is the same on Claude Web, Desktop, and Cowork, and you only need to do it once. The connector is tied to your account, so it's available in all three.

Also integrate Semanticscholar with

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Connecting Semanticscholar to Claude Web, Desktop, and Cowork

Two ways to add the Composio connector. Pick whichever you prefer.

1. Add with one click

Click the button. Claude opens with the Composio connector filled in. Click Add, then go to step 2.

Add to Claude

Add manually

In Claude Desktop, click Customize in the left sidebar, then select Connectors and click the + icon at the top.

Claude Desktop connectors screen with Add custom connector selected

Click Add custom connector and paste in the Composio MCP server URL:

bash
https://connect.composio.dev/mcp
Add custom connector dialog with Composio MCP server URL

2. Authorize in your browser

Click Connect. You'll be redirected to a browser window where you can authorize Composio to continue.

Composio authorization screen for Claude Web, Desktop, and Cowork

3. Connect your Semanticscholar account

Back in Claude, ask it to connect to Semanticscholar or give it any Semanticscholar-related task.

For example, ask Claude to:

  • "Find the latest papers on graph neural networks"
  • "List citations for a specific research paper"
  • "Summarize an author’s recent publications"

It will prompt you to authenticate and authorize access.

That's it. Composio's tools are now available in Claude, and your Semanticscholar account is ready to use.

What is the Semanticscholar Claude Connector, and what's possible with it?

The Semanticscholar MCP server is an implementation of the Model Context Protocol that connects your AI agent and assistants like Claude, Cursor, etc directly to your Semantic Scholar account. It provides structured and secure access to scholarly data, so your agent can search for academic papers, retrieve detailed author profiles, analyze citations, and explore references or publication histories on your behalf.

  • Comprehensive literature search and discovery: Let your agent search for academic papers by topic, author, or relevance and retrieve lists of matching publications with rich metadata.
  • In-depth paper and author insights: Ask your agent to fetch detailed information about specific papers—including titles, abstracts, authors, and publication years—or get complete profiles for researchers and their entire body of work.
  • Citation and reference analysis: Enable your agent to trace the impact of a paper by pulling its citations or explore the foundational research it builds upon by listing its references.
  • Batch retrieval for large-scale research: Efficiently gather details on multiple papers or authors at once, streamlining reviews and bibliometric analyses across large datasets.
  • Bulk and relevance-based queries: Use advanced bulk search and filtering to identify up to thousands of papers at a time, making it easy for your agent to support systematic literature reviews and academic data exploration.

Troubleshooting

1. Why does Claude not use the Composio connector for Semanticscholar?

The connector can show as connected, but Claude must use it in each Semanticscholar conversation.

  • Click + at the lower left of the chat, or type /.
  • Hover Connectors.
  • Turn on Composio.
  • Ask Claude to connect to Semanticscholar again.

2. Why does Claude show an MCP server error before Semanticscholar connects?

Claude can show Couldn't reach the MCP server or Authorization with the MCP server failed when you add the connector for Semanticscholar.

  • Check that the connector URL is https://connect.composio.dev/mcp.
  • Connectors run from Anthropic's cloud, so your device network is usually not the problem.
  • Add the connector again from Customize > Connectors, then ask Claude to connect Semanticscholar.
  • If it fails again, send the error and the ofid_ reference id to support@composio.dev.

3. Why does the Semanticscholar authorization link not work?

The Composio connector is one server. Your Semanticscholar account connects separately when Claude asks for it.

  • If the browser does not open, or the link expires, ask Claude to retry the Semanticscholar connection.
  • Composio creates a fresh Semanticscholar authorization link.
  • Open that link in your browser and finish the Semanticscholar sign-in.

4. Why do Semanticscholar actions fail after they worked before?

The Semanticscholar connection can expire or lose permission.

  • Ask Claude to inspect the Semanticscholar connection.
  • If the connection is unhealthy, disconnect it when Claude prompts you.
  • Reconnect the Semanticscholar account and retry the action.
  • If Claude shows a permission prompt, approve it before Claude changes data in Semanticscholar.
  • If the action still fails with a permission error, check that the connected account has that permission in Semanticscholar itself.

5. How do I switch to a different Semanticscholar account?

Claude can manage the Semanticscholar connection for you.

  • Ask Claude to disconnect or delete the current Semanticscholar account.
  • Ask Claude to connect Semanticscholar again.
  • Open the new Composio authorization link for Semanticscholar.
  • Sign in with the other Semanticscholar account in the browser.
  • After the account connects, ask Claude to retry the Semanticscholar task.

6. Why is my Semanticscholar connection missing in Claude Desktop or on a Team plan?

The connector belongs to your Claude account, so your Semanticscholar connection works in Claude Web, Desktop, and Cowork.

  • In Claude Desktop, open Customize > Connectors.
  • Next to Composio, click ⋮ and click Clear cache.
  • If Semanticscholar tools still do not appear, click ⋮, disconnect, remove the connector, and add it again.
  • On Team or Enterprise, an Owner or Primary Owner must enable the connector before you can connect Semanticscholar.
TOOLS

Supported Tools

Every Semanticscholar action and event your agent gets out of the box.

Details about an author

Retrieve detailed information about an author from Semantic Scholar, including name, affiliations, publication statistics (paperCount, citationCount, h-index), external IDs (ORCID, DBLP), and optionally papers.

Details about an author s papers

Retrieves a list of papers authored or co-authored by a specific researcher identified by their unique Semantic Scholar author ID.

Details about a paper

Examples: https://api.

Details about a paper s authors

Retrieves the list of authors for a specific paper identified by its unique paper_id in the Semantic Scholar database.

Details about a paper s citations

Retrieves a list of citations for a specific academic paper using its unique Semantic Scholar paper ID.

Details about a paper s references

Retrieves the list of references cited by a specific paper in the Semantic Scholar database.

Get dataset download links

Tool to get download links for a specific dataset within a release.

Get dataset diffs

Get download links for incremental diffs between dataset releases.

Get details for multiple authors at once

Retrieves detailed information for multiple authors from Semantic Scholar in a single API call.

Get details for multiple papers at once

Retrieve detailed information for multiple academic papers in a single API call using the Semantic Scholar paper batch endpoint.

Get paper recommendations

Tool to get paper recommendations based on positive and negative example papers.

Get recommendations for paper

Tool to get recommended papers for a single positive example paper.

Get dataset release information

Tool to retrieve metadata for a specific Semantic Scholar dataset release.

List available dataset releases

Tool to list all available dataset releases from Semantic Scholar.

Paper title search

Behaves similarly to /paper/search, but is intended for retrieval of a single paper based on closest title match to given query.

Search Bulk Papers

Tool to perform bulk search for academic papers.

Search for authors by name

Search for academic authors in the Semantic Scholar database by name.

Search papers by relevance

Tool to search for academic papers by relevance in the Semantic Scholar database.

Suggest paper query completions

Get autocomplete suggestions for paper queries.

Text snippet search

Search for text snippets (~500 words) within academic papers that match your natural language query.

FRAMEWORKS

How to build Semanticscholar MCP Agent with another framework

Claude Code logo

Claude Code

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Claude Code

OpenAI Agents SDK logo

OpenAI Agents SDK

Use Semanticscholar MCP with OpenAI Agents SDK

Claude Agent SDK logo

Claude Agent SDK

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Claude Agent SDK

Codex logo

Codex

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Codex

OpenClaw logo

OpenClaw

Use Semanticscholar MCP with OpenClaw

Hermes logo

Hermes

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Hermes

Atomic Agent logo

Atomic Agent

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Atomic Agent

Google ADK logo

Google ADK

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Google ADK

LangChain logo

LangChain

Use Semanticscholar MCP with LangChain

Vercel AI SDK logo

Vercel AI SDK

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Vercel AI SDK

Mastra AI logo

Mastra AI

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Mastra AI

LlamaIndex logo

LlamaIndex

Use Semanticscholar MCP with LlamaIndex

CrewAI logo

CrewAI

Use Semanticscholar MCP with CrewAI

Pydantic AI logo

Pydantic AI

Use Semanticscholar MCP with Pydantic AI

AutoGen logo

AutoGen

Use Semanticscholar MCP with AutoGen

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

With a standalone Semanticscholar MCP server, the agents and LLMs can only access a fixed set of Semanticscholar tools tied to that server. However, with the Composio Tool Router, agents can dynamically load tools from Semanticscholar and many other apps based on the task at hand, all through a single MCP endpoint.

Yes, you can. Claude Cowork fully supports MCP integration. You get structured tool calling, message history handling, and model orchestration while Tool Router takes care of discovering and serving the right Semanticscholar tools.

Yes, absolutely. You can configure which Semanticscholar scopes and actions are allowed when connecting your account to Composio. You can also bring your own OAuth credentials or API configuration so you keep full control over what the agent can do.

All sensitive data such as tokens, keys, and configuration is fully encrypted at rest and in transit. Composio is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant and follows strict security practices so your Semanticscholar data and credentials are handled as safely as possible.

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