Academia MCP

MCP server with tools to search, fetch, analyze, and report on scientific papers and datasets.

Features

ArXiv search and download
ACL Anthology search
Hugging Face datasets search
Semantic Scholar citations and references
Web search via Exa, Brave, or Tavily
Web page crawler, LaTeX compilation, PDF reading
Optional LLM-powered tools for document QA and research proposal workflows

Requirements

Python 3.12+

Install

Using pip (end users):

pip3 install academia-mcp

For development (uv + Makefile):

uv venv .venv
make install

Quickstart

Run over HTTP (default transport):

python -m academia_mcp --transport streamable-http
# OR
uv run -m academia_mcp --transport streamable-http

Run over stdio (for local MCP clients like Claude Desktop):

python -m academia_mcp --transport stdio
# OR
uv run -m academia_mcp --transport stdio

Notes:

Transports: stdio, sse, streamable-http.
host/port are used for HTTP transports; ignored for stdio. Default port is 5056 (or PORT).

Claude Desktop config

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "academia": {
      "command": "python3",
      "args": [
        "-m",
        "academia_mcp",
        "--transport",
        "stdio"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Available tools (one-liners)

arxiv_search: Query arXiv with field-specific queries and filters.
arxiv_download: Fetch a paper by ID and convert to structured text (HTML/PDF modes).
anthology_search: Search ACL Anthology with fielded queries and optional date filtering.
hf_datasets_search: Find Hugging Face datasets with filters and sorting.
s2_get_citations: List papers citing a given arXiv paper (Semantic Scholar Graph).
s2_get_references: List papers referenced by a given arXiv paper.
visit_webpage: Fetch and normalize a web page.
web_search: Unified search wrapper; available when at least one of Exa/Brave/Tavily keys is set.
exa_web_search, brave_web_search, tavily_web_search: Provider-specific search.
get_latex_templates_list, get_latex_template: Enumerate and fetch built-in LaTeX templates.
compile_latex: Compile LaTeX to PDF in WORKSPACE_DIR.
read_pdf: Extract text per page from a PDF.
download_pdf_paper, review_pdf_paper: Download and optionally review PDFs (requires LLM + workspace).
document_qa: Answer questions over provided document chunks (requires LLM).
extract_bitflip_info, generate_research_proposals, score_research_proposals: Research proposal helpers (requires LLM).

Availability notes:

Set WORKSPACE_DIR to enable compile_latex, read_pdf, download_pdf_paper, and review_pdf_paper.
Set OPENROUTER_API_KEY to enable LLM tools (document_qa, review_pdf_paper, and bitflip tools).
Set one or more of EXA_API_KEY, BRAVE_API_KEY, TAVILY_API_KEY to enable web_search and provider tools.

Environment variables

Set as needed, depending on which tools you use:

OPENROUTER_API_KEY: required for LLM-related tools.
BASE_URL: override OpenRouter base URL.
DOCUMENT_QA_MODEL_NAME: override default model for document_qa.
BITFLIP_MODEL_NAME: override default model for bitflip tools.
TAVILY_API_KEY: enables Tavily in web_search.
EXA_API_KEY: enables Exa in web_search and visit_webpage.
BRAVE_API_KEY: enables Brave in web_search.
WORKSPACE_DIR: directory for generated files (PDFs, temp artifacts).
PORT: HTTP port (default 5056).

You can put these in a .env file in the project root.

Docker

Build the image:

docker build -t academia_mcp .

Run the server (HTTP):

docker run --rm -p 5056:5056 \
  -e PORT=5056 \
  -e OPENROUTER_API_KEY=your_key_here \
  -e WORKSPACE_DIR=/workspace \
  -v "$PWD/workdir:/workspace" \
  academia_mcp

Or use existing image: phoenix120/academia_mcp

Examples

Comprehensive report screencast (YouTube)
Single paper screencast (YouTube)

Makefile targets

make install: install the package in editable mode with uv
make validate: run black, flake8, and mypy (strict)
make test: run the test suite with pytest
make publish: build and publish using uv

LaTeX/PDF requirements

Only needed for LaTeX/PDF tools. Ensure a LaTeX distribution is installed and pdflatex is on PATH, as well as latexmk. On Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt install texlive-latex-base texlive-fonts-recommended texlive-latex-extra texlive-science latexmk