How to integrate Semanticscholar MCP with Google ADK

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Introduction

This guide walks you through connecting Semanticscholar to Google ADK using the Composio tool router. By the end, you'll have a working Semanticscholar agent that can find the latest papers on graph neural networks, list citations for a specific research paper, summarize an author’s recent publications through natural language commands.

This guide will help you understand how to give your Google ADK agent real control over a Semanticscholar account through Composio's Semanticscholar MCP server.

Before we dive in, let's take a quick look at the key ideas and tools involved.

Also integrate Semanticscholar with

TL;DR

Here's what you'll learn:
  • Get a Semanticscholar account set up and connected to Composio
  • Install the Google ADK and Composio packages
  • Create a Composio Tool Router session for Semanticscholar
  • Build an agent that connects to Semanticscholar through MCP
  • Interact with Semanticscholar using natural language

What is Google ADK?

Google ADK (Agents Development Kit) is Google's framework for building AI agents powered by Gemini models. It provides tools for creating agents that can use external services through the Model Context Protocol.

Key features include:

  • Gemini Integration: Native support for Google's Gemini models
  • MCP Toolset: Built-in support for Model Context Protocol tools
  • Streamable HTTP: Connect to external services through streamable HTTP
  • CLI and Web UI: Run agents via command line or web interface

What is the Semanticscholar MCP server, 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.

Supported Tools & Triggers

Tools
Details about an authorRetrieve 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 papersRetrieves a list of papers authored or co-authored by a specific researcher identified by their unique Semantic Scholar author ID.
Details about a paperExamples: https://api.
Details about a paper s authorsRetrieves the list of authors for a specific paper identified by its unique paper_id in the Semantic Scholar database.
Details about a paper s citationsRetrieves a list of citations for a specific academic paper using its unique Semantic Scholar paper ID.
Details about a paper s referencesRetrieves the list of references cited by a specific paper in the Semantic Scholar database.
Get dataset download linksTool to get download links for a specific dataset within a release.
Get dataset diffsGet download links for incremental diffs between dataset releases.
Get details for multiple authors at onceRetrieves detailed information for multiple authors from Semantic Scholar in a single API call.
Get details for multiple papers at onceRetrieve detailed information for multiple academic papers in a single API call using the Semantic Scholar paper batch endpoint.
Get paper recommendationsTool to get paper recommendations based on positive and negative example papers.
Get recommendations for paperTool to get recommended papers for a single positive example paper.
Get dataset release informationTool to retrieve metadata for a specific Semantic Scholar dataset release.
List available dataset releasesTool to list all available dataset releases from Semantic Scholar.
Paper title searchBehaves similarly to /paper/search, but is intended for retrieval of a single paper based on closest title match to given query.
Search Bulk PapersTool to perform bulk search for academic papers.
Search for authors by nameSearch for academic authors in the Semantic Scholar database by name.
Search papers by relevanceTool to search for academic papers by relevance in the Semantic Scholar database.
Suggest paper query completionsGet autocomplete suggestions for paper queries.
Text snippet searchSearch for text snippets (~500 words) within academic papers that match your natural language query.

What is the Composio tool router, and how does it fit here?

What is Composio SDK?

Composio's Composio SDK helps agents find the right tools for a task at runtime. You can plug in multiple toolkits (like Gmail, HubSpot, and GitHub), and the agent will identify the relevant app and action to complete multi-step workflows. This can reduce token usage and improve the reliability of tool calls. Read more here: Getting started with Composio SDK

The tool router generates a secure MCP URL that your agents can access to perform actions.

How the Composio SDK works

The Composio SDK follows a three-phase workflow:

  1. Discovery: Searches for tools matching your task and returns relevant toolkits with their details.
  2. Authentication: Checks for active connections. If missing, creates an auth config and returns a connection URL via Auth Link.
  3. Execution: Executes the action using the authenticated connection.

Step-by-step Guide

Prerequisites

Before starting, make sure you have:
  • A Google API key for Gemini models
  • A Composio account and API key
  • Python 3.9 or later installed
  • Basic familiarity with Python

Getting API Keys for Google and Composio

Google API Key
  • Go to Google AI Studio and create an API key.
  • Copy the key and keep it safe. You will put this in GOOGLE_API_KEY.
Composio API Key and User ID
  • Log in to the Composio dashboard.
  • Go to Settings → API Keys and copy your Composio API key. Use this for COMPOSIO_API_KEY.
  • Decide on a stable user identifier to scope sessions, often your email or a user ID. Use this for COMPOSIO_USER_ID.

Install dependencies

bash
pip install google-adk composio python-dotenv

Inside your virtual environment, install the required packages.

What's happening:

  • google-adk is Google's Agents Development Kit
  • composio connects your agent to Semanticscholar via MCP
  • python-dotenv loads environment variables

Set up ADK project

bash
adk create my_agent

Set up a new Google ADK project.

What's happening:

  • This creates an agent folder with a root agent file and .env file

Set environment variables

bash
GOOGLE_API_KEY=your-google-api-key
COMPOSIO_API_KEY=your-composio-api-key
COMPOSIO_USER_ID=your-user-id-or-email

Save all your credentials in the .env file.

What's happening:

  • GOOGLE_API_KEY authenticates with Google's Gemini models
  • COMPOSIO_API_KEY authenticates with Composio
  • COMPOSIO_USER_ID identifies the user for session management

Import modules and validate environment

python
import os
import warnings

from composio import Composio
from dotenv import load_dotenv
from google.adk.agents.llm_agent import Agent
from google.adk.tools.mcp_tool.mcp_session_manager import StreamableHTTPConnectionParams
from google.adk.tools.mcp_tool.mcp_toolset import McpToolset

load_dotenv()

warnings.filterwarnings("ignore", message=".*BaseAuthenticatedTool.*")

GOOGLE_API_KEY = os.getenv("GOOGLE_API_KEY")
COMPOSIO_API_KEY = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")
COMPOSIO_USER_ID = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_USER_ID")

if not GOOGLE_API_KEY:
    raise ValueError("GOOGLE_API_KEY is not set in the environment.")
if not COMPOSIO_API_KEY:
    raise ValueError("COMPOSIO_API_KEY is not set in the environment.")
if not COMPOSIO_USER_ID:
    raise ValueError("COMPOSIO_USER_ID is not set in the environment.")
What's happening:
  • os reads environment variables
  • Composio is the main Composio SDK client
  • GoogleProvider declares that you are using Google ADK as the agent runtime
  • Agent is the Google ADK LLM agent class
  • McpToolset lets the ADK agent call MCP tools over HTTP

Create Composio client and Tool Router session

python
composio_client = Composio(api_key=COMPOSIO_API_KEY)

composio_session = composio_client.create(
    user_id=COMPOSIO_USER_ID,
    toolkits=["semanticscholar"],
)

COMPOSIO_MCP_URL = composio_session.mcp.url,
print(f"Composio MCP URL: {COMPOSIO_MCP_URL}")
What's happening:
  • Authenticates to Composio with your API key
  • Declares Google ADK as the provider
  • Spins up a short-lived MCP endpoint for your user and selected toolkit
  • Stores the MCP HTTP URL for the ADK MCP integration

Set up the McpToolset and create the Agent

python
composio_toolset = McpToolset(
    connection_params=StreamableHTTPConnectionParams(
        url=COMPOSIO_MCP_URL,
        headers={"x-api-key": COMPOSIO_API_KEY}
    )
)

root_agent = Agent(
    model="gemini-2.5-flash",
    name="composio_agent",
    description="An agent that uses Composio tools to perform actions.",
    instruction=(
        "You are a helpful assistant connected to Composio. "
        "You have the following tools available: "
        "COMPOSIO_SEARCH_TOOLS, COMPOSIO_MULTI_EXECUTE_TOOL, "
        "COMPOSIO_MANAGE_CONNECTIONS, COMPOSIO_REMOTE_BASH_TOOL, COMPOSIO_REMOTE_WORKBENCH. "
        "Use these tools to help users with Semanticscholar operations."
    ),
    tools=[composio_toolset],
)

print("\nAgent setup complete. You can now run this agent directly ;)")
What's happening:
  • Connects the ADK agent to the Composio MCP endpoint through McpToolset
  • Uses Gemini as the model powering the agent
  • Lists exact tool names in instruction to reduce misnamed tool calls

Run the agent

bash
# Run in CLI mode
adk run my_agent

# Or run in web UI mode
adk web

Execute the agent from the project root. The web command opens a web portal where you can chat with the agent.

What's happening:

  • adk run runs the agent in CLI mode
  • adk web . opens a web UI for interactive testing

Complete Code

Here's the complete code to get you started with Semanticscholar and Google ADK:

python
import os
import warnings

from composio import Composio
from composio_google import GoogleProvider
from dotenv import load_dotenv
from google.adk.agents.llm_agent import Agent
from google.adk.tools.mcp_tool.mcp_session_manager import StreamableHTTPConnectionParams
from google.adk.tools.mcp_tool.mcp_toolset import McpToolset

load_dotenv()
warnings.filterwarnings("ignore", message=".*BaseAuthenticatedTool.*")

GOOGLE_API_KEY = os.getenv("GOOGLE_API_KEY")
COMPOSIO_API_KEY = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_API_KEY")
COMPOSIO_USER_ID = os.getenv("COMPOSIO_USER_ID")

if not GOOGLE_API_KEY:
    raise ValueError("GOOGLE_API_KEY is not set in the environment.")
if not COMPOSIO_API_KEY:
    raise ValueError("COMPOSIO_API_KEY is not set in the environment.")
if not COMPOSIO_USER_ID:
    raise ValueError("COMPOSIO_USER_ID is not set in the environment.")

composio_client = Composio(api_key=COMPOSIO_API_KEY, provider=GoogleProvider())

composio_session = composio_client.create(
    user_id=COMPOSIO_USER_ID,
    toolkits=["semanticscholar"],
)

COMPOSIO_MCP_URL = composio_session.mcp.url


composio_toolset = McpToolset(
    connection_params=StreamableHTTPConnectionParams(
        url=COMPOSIO_MCP_URL,
        headers={"x-api-key": COMPOSIO_API_KEY}
    )
)

root_agent = Agent(
    model="gemini-2.5-flash",
    name="composio_agent",
    description="An agent that uses Composio tools to perform actions.",
    instruction=(
        "You are a helpful assistant connected to Composio. "
        "You have the following tools available: "
        "COMPOSIO_SEARCH_TOOLS, COMPOSIO_MULTI_EXECUTE_TOOL, "
        "COMPOSIO_MANAGE_CONNECTIONS, COMPOSIO_REMOTE_BASH_TOOL, COMPOSIO_REMOTE_WORKBENCH. "
        "Use these tools to help users with Semanticscholar operations."
    ),  
    tools=[composio_toolset],
)

print("\nAgent setup complete. You can now run this agent directly ;)")

Conclusion

You've successfully integrated Semanticscholar with the Google ADK through Composio's MCP Tool Router. Your agent can now interact with Semanticscholar using natural language commands.

Key takeaways:

  • The Tool Router approach dynamically routes requests to the appropriate Semanticscholar tools
  • Environment variables keep your credentials secure and separate from code
  • Clear agent instructions reduce tool calling errors
  • The ADK web UI provides an interactive interface for testing and development

You can extend this setup by adding more toolkits to the toolkits array in your session configuration.

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FAQ

What are the differences in Tool Router MCP and Semanticscholar MCP?

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.

Can I use Tool Router MCP with Google ADK?

Yes, you can. Google ADK 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.

Can I manage the permissions and scopes for Semanticscholar while using Tool Router?

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.

How safe is my data with Composio Tool Router?

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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