Agent skill

research

This skill should be used when the user asks to "find papers", "search academic literature", "find citations", "literature search", "find research on", "what does the literature say about", or any request to search for academic papers across multiple sources.

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Install this agent skill to your Project

npx add-skill https://github.com/edwinhu/workflows/tree/main/skills/research

SKILL.md

Academic Literature Search

Multi-source academic search with deduplication, DOI resolution, and journal filtering.

Always read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../google-scholar/domain-knowledge.local.md before presenting results.

IRON LAW: Always Use the Script

NEVER run the sources manually in sequence. ALWAYS use the research script. This is not negotiable.

bash
python3 "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/research.py" "<query>" [--n 50] [--min-citations N]

The script parallelizes all sources and DOI resolution automatically. Doing it manually serializes everything and triples wall time.

Sources

Source Tool Strength Default
scholar lookup Keyword/citation-ranked Finance classics, foundational papers
consensus CLI Empirical corpus, sorted by citations Accounting/finance empirical literature
Paperpile bib Personal library (My Library.bib) Papers already in your collection
scholar search NL semantic Law reviews, conceptual literature opt-in (--scholar-search)

scholar search is opt-in because it shares rate limits with scholar lookup and 429s when run in parallel. Add --scholar-search when you specifically want semantic/NL results.

Output Schema

The script outputs a JSON array. Each paper has:

json
{
  "title": "...",
  "authors": ["..."],
  "year": 2023,
  "journal": "...",           // original journal label (may be SSRN)
  "journal_resolved": "...",  // CrossRef-resolved journal (present if SSRN label was resolved)
  "doi": "...",
  "citations": 150,
  "takeaway": "...",
  "url": "...",
  "sources": ["lookup", "consensus"]  // all sources that returned this paper
}

LLM Review Step (After Script)

After running the script, read ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../google-scholar/domain-knowledge.local.md and cross-reference each paper's effective journal (use journal_resolved if present, else journal) against the trusted list:

  • ★ = journal matches trusted list
  • Papers in sources: ["lookup", "consensus"] (multiple sources) = higher confidence
  • Papers from bib source = already in user's library (flag with 📚)

Presentation Format

★ [Title](url) — Authors (Year), *Journal*, N citations  [sources]
  > Takeaway: ...

📚 ★ [Title](url) — Authors (Year), *Journal*  [in your library]
  > Takeaway: ...

Trusted papers first (sorted by citations desc), then non-trusted in a collapsed table.

Red Flags — STOP If You Catch Yourself:

Action Why Wrong Do Instead
Running sources manually instead of using the script Serializes work, triples wall time python3 research.py "<query>"
Using mcp__consensus__search Rate-limited to 3 results Script uses CLI binary automatically
Presenting before reading domain-knowledge.local.md User expects ★ signals Read it first, always
Using journal field when journal_resolved is present SSRN label hides real venue Always prefer journal_resolved

Common Patterns

bash
# Standard search
python3 "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/research.py" "mandatory disclosure"

# With citation floor
python3 "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/research.py" "poison pill" --min-citations 50

# More results from Consensus
python3 "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/research.py" "corporate governance" --n 100

# Disable streaming (wait for all sources, output pretty-printed JSON)
python3 "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/research.py" "mandatory disclosure" --no-stream

Streaming Mode (default)

Without --stream, the script waits for all four sources before emitting anything — Consensus takes ~60s, so fast sources (bib <1s, Scholar ~10s) sit idle.

With --stream, the script emits one NDJSON line per event as it happens:

json
{"event": "source", "source": "bib", "papers": [...]}
{"event": "source", "source": "scholar-lookup", "papers": [...]}
{"event": "source", "source": "scholar-search", "papers": [...]}
{"event": "source", "source": "consensus", "papers": [...]}
{"event": "final", "papers": [...]}
  • source events: raw papers from each source as it completes (may have duplicates across sources)
  • final event: deduplicated + CrossRef-resolved unified set

Process source events as they arrive to present early results; use final for the complete deduplicated list. Pass --no-stream for batch mode (pretty-printed JSON after all sources complete).

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