mcp-nasa-adsSAFE
NASA ADS — the Astrophysics Data System, api.adsabs.harvard.edu.
Overview
From the repository's own README, as read at the audited commit. Badges and raw HTML are left out.
The NASA Astrophysics Data System — essentially the complete bibliography of astronomy and astrophysics since 1823, with hand-curated citation and reference graphs.
Part of Pipeworx — an MCP gateway connecting AI agents to 1683+ live data sources.
Tools
ads_search(query, sort?, limit?, start?, include_abstract?)— search the literature with the
full ADS query syntax (author:"Rubin, V", year:2020-2024, bibstem:ApJ, abs:"phrase", property:refereed).
ads_paper(identifier)— the full record for one paper by bibcode, DOI or arXiv id. The
identifier form is detected and searched in the right field, so a DOI never silently free-text matches an unrelated paper.
ads_citations(bibcode, direction?, sort?, limit?, start?)— papers citing this one
(citations, default) or its bibliography (references).
Auth
BYO only. Pass _apiKey. There is no keyless path: ADS Bearer-authenticates every endpoint and an unauthenticated request is a flat 401 Missing "Authorization" in headers (verified 2026-09-17). The refusal says "requires an API key" so a caller is not left reading a 401 as our outage.
The token is free and generous: create an account at then Settings → API Token ().
Platform fallback: `PLATFORM_ADS_TOKEN`. Until that secret is set, the pack-manifest entry carries byoExpected: true; remove it in the same change that lands the value.
Data sources
- — every tool here is one call to this endpoint
with a different q. ads_citations uses ADS's own citations(bibcode:...) and references(bibcode:...) operators rather than a separate endpoint.
Traps
- `fl` is not optional in practice. Omit it and ADS returns bare ids with no title, author or
year — a clean 200 that looks like a stripped result set. Every call here sends
31abdec0e45dOBSERVED · 2026-10-11Connect
Built from this server's own package name, version and transport as found in its source — not copied from anyone's documentation, so it cannot drift against a page we do not control.
claude mcp add mcp-nasa-ads -- npx -y @pipeworx/[email protected]
{
"mcpServers": {
"mcp-nasa-ads": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"-y",
"@pipeworx/[email protected]"
]
}
}
}Exposed tools (3)
3 read · 0 write · 0 destructive.
| Tool | Risk | Description |
|---|---|---|
ads_citations | read | Papers that cite a given paper, or the papers it cites — the ADS citation graph, which is |
ads_paper | read | Full record for one paper by bibcode, DOI or arXiv id — title, every author, journal, |
ads_search | read | Search the NASA Astrophysics Data System — the complete bibliography of astronomy and |
Trust audit
SAFEgrade B · trust 89/100 Nothing in the source contradicts what it says it does. Grade A is reserved for packages that have also passed the behavioural sandbox.
| Layer | What it checks | Result |
|---|---|---|
| L0 | Provenance & inventory | PASS |
| L1 | Static analysis of the code | PASS |
| L2 | Instruction surface (what it tells the agent) | PASS |
| L3 | Class-specific surface | PASS |
| L4 | Behavioural (sandbox) | SKIPPED |
What the source does
- Filesystem
- none-observed
- Network
- declared (1 observation(s))
- Shell
- none-observed
- Dependencies
- not all pinned
- Secrets in source
- none-found
Findings (1)
@modelcontextprotocol/sdk, tsx, typescript, @cloudflare/workers-types
Gates applied: no_behavioural_pass.
31abdec0e45dfull audit observations/trust-audit/mcp-server/pipeworx-io__mcp-nasa-ads.json · Report an issue / request a re-scanAudit history
Every audit this server has had. A grade with a past is a grade somebody is still checking.
| Date | Source | Verdict | Grade | Score | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-10-11 | 31abdec0e45d | SAFE | B | 89 | first audit |
Questions
What is the mcp-nasa-ads MCP server?
NASA ADS — the Astrophysics Data System, api.adsabs.harvard.edu.
What tools does mcp-nasa-ads expose?
3 in total: 3 read-only, 0 that write, and 0 that can delete or overwrite. Every one is listed on this page with its risk.
Is mcp-nasa-ads safe to connect to an agent?
The audit found nothing in the source that contradicts what it says it does, and graded it B (89/100). Grade A is held back for packages that have also passed a sandboxed behavioural run, which is why a clean server reads B.
What credentials does mcp-nasa-ads need?
No credential environment variables were found in its source, so it appears to need none.
How does mcp-nasa-ads run?
It speaks stdio and streamable-http, so it runs as a local process your client starts. It is published on npm as @pipeworx/mcp-nasa-ads at 0.1.1.
How current is this page?
The grade is for one exact copy of the source (31abdec0e45d), read on 2026-10-11. The repository is watched and re-audited when it changes.