browse_download

The browse_download tool downloads paper PDFs from academic databases using paper identifiers. It supports batch downloads and returns the paths of downloaded files.

Basic Usage

Download a single paper:

browse_download([
    {"searcher": "arxiv", "paper_id": "2303.08774"}
])

Download multiple papers:

browse_download([
    {"searcher": "arxiv", "paper_id": "2303.08774"},
    {"searcher": "pubmed", "paper_id": "32790614"},
    {"searcher": "pmc", "paper_id": "PMC7419405"}
])

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
searcher	string	Yes	Source platform for download
paper_id	string	Yes	Paper identifier (1-200 characters)

Paper ID Formats

Each platform uses different identifier formats:

Searcher	ID Format	Example
arxiv	arXiv ID	2303.08774
pubmed	PubMed ID (PMID)	32790614
pmc	PMC ID	PMC7419405
biorxiv	bioRxiv DOI	10.1101/2020.01.01.123456
medrxiv	medRxiv DOI	10.1101/2020.01.01.123456
iacr	IACR Paper ID	2009/101
crossref	DOI	10.1038/s41586-020-2649-2
core	CORE ID	123456789
semantic	Semantic Scholar ID	See formats below

Semantic Scholar ID Formats

Semantic Scholar accepts multiple identifier formats:

Format	Example
Semantic Scholar ID	649def34f8be52c8b66281af98ae884c09aef38b
DOI prefix	DOI:10.18653/v1/N18-3011
arXiv prefix	ARXIV:2106.15928
MAG prefix	MAG:112218234
ACL prefix	ACL:W12-3903
PMID prefix	PMID:19872477
PMCID prefix	PMCID:2323736
URL prefix	URL:https://arxiv.org/abs/2106.15928v1

Download Examples

Free Data Sources

# Download from arXiv
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "arxiv", "paper_id": "2106.12345"}
])

# Download from PubMed
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "pubmed", "paper_id": "32790614"}
])

# Download from PubMed Central
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "pmc", "paper_id": "PMC7419405"}
])

# Download from bioRxiv
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "biorxiv", "paper_id": "10.1101/2020.01.01.123456"}
])

# Download from Semantic Scholar
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "semantic", "paper_id": "DOI:10.18653/v1/N18-3011"}
])

# Download from CORE
browse_download([
    {"searcher": "core", "paper_id": "123456789"}
])

Batch Download

browse_download([
    {"searcher": "arxiv", "paper_id": "2106.12345"},
    {"searcher": "pubmed", "paper_id": "32790614"},
    {"searcher": "pmc", "paper_id": "PMC7419405"},
    {"searcher": "biorxiv", "paper_id": "10.1101/2020.01.01.123456"},
    {"searcher": "semantic", "paper_id": "DOI:10.18653/v1/N18-3011"}
])

Response Format

The tool returns a list of file paths for successfully downloaded papers:

[
  "./downloads/arxiv_2106.12345.pdf",
  "./downloads/pubmed_32790614.pdf",
  "./downloads/pmc_PMC7419405.pdf"
]

For failed downloads, error messages are included:

[
  "./downloads/arxiv_2106.12345.pdf",
  "Error downloading paper 99999999 from pubmed: Paper not found"
]

Download Path

PDFs are saved to the directory specified by the BROWSE_MCP_DOWNLOAD_PATH environment variable. The default is ./downloads.

To change the download path:

{
  "env": {
    "BROWSE_MCP_DOWNLOAD_PATH": "/path/to/your/downloads"
  }
}

Input Validation

• searcher: Must be one of the enabled data sources
• paper_id: Must be 1-200 characters, cannot be empty

:::caution Paid Data Sources Paid data sources (IEEE, Springer, ScienceDirect, Scopus) require institutional access or subscription to download PDFs. Even with an API key, PDF access depends on your subscription level. :::

Error Handling

Common errors:

Error	Cause	Solution
Paper not found	Invalid paper ID	Verify paper ID format
Access denied	No subscription	Use free data sources or check subscription
Network error	Connection failed	Retry download
Searcher unavailable	Data source not enabled	Enable the data source in configuration

Tips

• Use paper IDs from browse_search results to ensure accurate downloads
• Batch downloads are processed concurrently for faster results
• If files are missing, check the download path

Next Steps

• browse_read - Extract text from downloaded papers
• browse_search - Search for papers to download
• MCP Configuration - Configure download path