Base URL: https://api.adsabs.harvard.edu/v1/search
All text values shoud be UTF-8 and url-encoded. The response body will be json encoded.
Note that the search API uses the same syntax as Apache Solr. For a full reference of query possibilities, please refer to the Solr documentation and ADS Search Help. The sections below present useful parameters and patterns for the vast majority of use cases, but are not meant to be exhaustive.
https://api.adsabs.harvard.edu/v1/search/query
The basic interface to the ADS data holdings. Query our search engine and receive the cooresponding documents back.
required: a UTF-8, url-encoded string of <= 1000 characters representing the search query. q can be used for both fielded (title:exoplanets), and unfielded (exoplanets) search. See the list of fields below.
number of results to return. Default is 10.
starting point for returned results (for pagination). Default is 0.
Specify the fields contained in each returned document. Value should be a comma-separated list of field names.
Filter your query results using a particular field:value condition. This parameter is repeatable.
fieldcan be any field listed in the field descriptions belowvalueshould be a UTF-8, url-encoded string
Indicate how you wish the result set sorted. The format is field direction where direction is one of asc or desc, and field is a field in the document that contains a numerical value. The default sorting is by relevance (computed by our search engine).
Example of a properly formated & encoded sort param is sort=read_count+desc
Some useful fields to sort by may be pubdate, citation_count, or num_readers.
Below are some fields noted here for their high usefulness that are available to all API users:
bibcode- the canonical ADS bibcode identifier for this recordbibstem- the abbreviated name of the journal or publication, e.g., ApJ.id- a unique integer for this recordidentifier- an array of alternative identifiers for the record. May contain alternative bibcodes, DOIs and/or arxiv ids.title- the title of the recordauthor- an array of the author names associated with the recordpub- the canonical name of the publication the record appeared inkeyword- an array of normalized and un-normalized keyword values associated with the recordabstract- the abstract of the recordaff- an array of the authors' affiliationsproperty- an array of miscellaneous flags associated with the record. Possible values include: ARTICLE, REFEREED, NOT_REFEREED, INPROCEEDINGS, OPENACCESS, NONARTICLE, EPRINT, BOOK, PROCEEDINGS, CATALOG, SOFTWARE (@aacommazzi didn't we remove/clean up some of these? Could you tell me which, if any, don't belong here)volume- volume the record appeared inissue- issue the record appeared inpage- starting pagecitation_count- number of citations the item has receivedread_count- number of times the record has been viewed within in a 90-day windows (ads and arxiv)pubdate- publication date in the form YYYY-MM-DD (DD value will always be "00")database- Which database the record is associated with.
The ADS content is divided into a few separate databases: "astronomy", "physics" & "general". By default, queries will return results from all three. To limit a search to "astronomy" articles, add fq=database:astronomy to the request parameters.
Assuming your access token is my_token, all queries can be executed by any HTTP client. An example curl request is:
curl -H "Authorization: Bearer my_token" https://api.adsabs.harvard.edu/v1/search/query
...and by adding the following query params, the response will contain relevant documents:
# Search by bibcode
?q=bibcode:2011ApJ...737..103S
# Search for "black holes", restricted to astronomy content
?q=black+holes&fq=database:astronomy
# Search for "dark energy", filter by author, sort by citation count
?q=dark+energy&fq=author:"Civano,+F"&sort=citation_count+desc
# Same search but only return *bibcode* and *property* values
?q=dark+energy&fq=author:"Civano,+F"&sort=citation_count+desc&fl=bibcode,property
# Limit a search to only refereed articles
?q=author:"Kurtz,+M"&fq=property:refereed
# Search for "transiting exoplanets", get 200 rows
?q=transiting+exoplanets&rows=200
# Same search but get the next 200 rows
?q=transiting+exoplanets&rows=200&start=201
{
"bibcode": "2012A&A...542A..16R",
"author": [
"Ranalli, P.",
"Comastri, A.",
...
],
"pub": "Astronomy and Astrophysics",
"identifier": [
"2012arXiv1204.4485R",
"arXiv:1204.4485",
"2012A&A...542A..16R"
],
"title": "X-ray properties of radio-selected star forming galaxies in the Chandra-COSMOS survey",
"property": [
"REFEREED",
"ARTICLE"
],
"abstract": "X-ray surveys contain sizable numbers of star forming galaxies, ..."
"keyword": [
"astronomy x rays",
"astronomy radio",
"galaxies fundamental parameters",
"galaxies star clusters",
"galaxies active",
...
],
"aff": [
"Università di Bologna, Dipartimento di Astronomia, via Ranzani 1, 40127, Bologna, Italy ; Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, National Observatory of Athens, Palaia Penteli, 15236, Athens, Greece; INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna, via Ranzani 1, 40127, Bologna, Italy",
"INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna, via Ranzani 1, 40127, Bologna, Italy",
...
],
}
The q parameter supports both fielded and unfielded searching:
black holestitle:blacktitle:holes
Use quotation marks to indicate phrase searching:
"black holes"title:"black holes"
Prepend terms with "+" or "-" to indicate inclusion or exclusion:
+transiting exoplanets"dark energy" -"weak lensing"
To filter by a publication date range you can use either the year or pubdate fields:
pubdate:[2013-07-00 TO *]pubdate:[2005-01 TO 2007-01]pubdate:2013-02year:2013year:[2012 TO 2013]
The default search uses a boolean AND between terms, but you may use OR and AND in combination with () to create more complex queries.
Prefix queries (wildcards, *) are supported for most fields.