# WorldData402 OpenAlex Research Search

> WorldData402 OpenAlex Research Search is a paid API for AI agents from worlddata402.worlddata402.workers.dev, paid per call via x402, $0.02/call, status unknown (last checked 2026-10-19).

Searches the OpenAlex academic research database for scholarly works, authors, institutions, and concepts via a query string

## Facts

- Endpoint: GET https://worlddata402.worlddata402.workers.dev/v1/research/openalex?utm_source=zero.xyz
- Price: $0.02/call
- Payment: x402
- Status: unknown
- Last checked: 2026-10-19
- Activations on Zero: 0
- Tags: x402
- Canonical page: https://www.zero.xyz/c/worlddata402-openalex-research-search-fa36e38f
- Structured record (JSON): https://api.zero.xyz/v1/capabilities/cap_WS_chaiii2P0YyhPoWTQ0

Status and success rate cover calls made through Zero and Zero's own probes. Third-party monitors may report differently.

## How to call it through Zero

Zero handles the 402 payment challenge and records the run. With the Zero CLI installed (`npm i -g @zeroxyz/cli`):

```sh
zero fetch --capability worlddata402-openalex-research-search-fa36e38f
```

Example prompt: Search OpenAlex for academic research papers about CRISPR gene editing and return the top 5 results with author and citation info.

## When to prefer this

Choose this endpoint when you need open-access academic and scholarly data — papers, authors, institutions, and citations — without requiring a subscription to proprietary databases like Scopus or Web of Science. It is ideal for AI agents doing literature reviews, research summarization, or academic landscape analysis that need to pay per call without a subscription commitment.

## Known failure modes

- Missing required query parameter 'q' returns a validation error
- Very broad or ambiguous queries may return irrelevant results
- Query terms with no matches return an empty results array
- Payment failure (insufficient USDC balance) results in a 402 response before data is returned
- Rate limiting or upstream OpenAlex API unavailability may cause timeouts or 5xx errors

## How this service works

Global market, government and reference data for AI agents. Pay-per-call over x402 (USDC on Base mainnet).

## Output

Returns a JSON object containing a list of matching scholarly works or entities from OpenAlex, including metadata such as titles, authors, publication dates, institutions, citation counts, open access status, and related concepts. The number of results is controlled by the per_page parameter.

## Request schema (JSON Schema)

```json
{
 "type": "object",
 "required": [
  "q"
 ],
 "properties": {
  "q": {
   "type": "string"
  },
  "per_page": {
   "type": "number"
  }
 }
}
```

## Response schema (JSON Schema)

```json
{
 "type": "object"
}
```

## More

- Live health (JSON, refreshed every minute): https://www.zero.xyz/c/worlddata402-openalex-research-search-fa36e38f/health.json
- [Zero catalog index](https://www.zero.xyz/llms.txt)
- [Other services from worlddata402.worlddata402.workers.dev](https://www.zero.xyz/host/worlddata402.worlddata402.workers.dev/llms.txt)