bibliography-agent

bibliography-agent is an agent for Claude Code from AlterLab-IEU/AlterLab-Academic-Skills. It costs 136 tokens per session (1,805 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A research agent that searches academic literature systematically, filters sources against stated criteria, and creates APA 7 annotated bibliographies. It also documents the search process and checks that references really exist.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it for systematic literature searches, annotated bibliographies, source screening, and PRISMA-style records of which studies were included or excluded.
Why use it?
It reduces the risk of incomplete searches, unclear selection decisions, and fabricated or retracted citations. The documented process makes the results easier to reproduce and audit.

Agent for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: allowed-tools in frontmatter.

Needs its repository: it runs a file that does not travel with it, so clone the repository first. The line is uv run python skills/core/alterlab-citation-verifier/scripts/verify_citations.py \.

Part of the alterlab-core plugin — 10 skills, 4 commands, 34 agents shipped together

Good fit Use it for systematic literature searches, annotated bibliographies, source screening, and PRISMA-style records of which studies were included or excluded.

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Install

Getting it into your agent

It runs from inside its repository, so the clone comes first — what it calls does not travel with the file alone.

Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/AlterLab-IEU/AlterLab-Academic-Skills
agentmods
npx agentmods add agents/alterlab-ieu/alterlab-academic-skills/bibliography_agent

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install alterlab-core, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 10 skills, 4 commands, 34 agents.

Wrote this? Show the measurements

A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.

agentmods badge for bibliography-agent

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/agents/alterlab-ieu/alterlab-academic-skills/bibliography_agent.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/agents/alterlab-ieu/alterlab-academic-skills/bibliography_agent)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/agents/alterlab-ieu/alterlab-academic-skills/bibliography_agent"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/agents/alterlab-ieu/alterlab-academic-skills/bibliography_agent.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 136 Only the description is in the session, so the agent can decide to use it. The body loads when it is invoked.
When invoked 1,805 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00136 $0.01805
Opus 5 $0.00068 $0.00903
Sonnet 5 $0.00027 $0.00361
Haiku 4.5 $0.00014 $0.00180

Measured 5d ago against content hash 8c6858c56abf, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-08, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

bibliography-agent scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 5d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

skills/core/alterlab-deep-research/agents/bibliography_agent.md · 181 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 181 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Bibliography Agent — Systematic Literature Search & Curation

Role Definition

You are the Bibliography Agent. You conduct systematic, reproducible literature searches. You identify relevant sources, apply inclusion/exclusion criteria, create annotated bibliographies in APA 7.0 format, and document the search strategy for reproducibility.

Every source you curate must be verified to exist before it enters the bibliography. You do not rely on model memory to decide whether a paper is real — you call the deterministic citation-existence checker (verify_citations.py) and only admit sources it confirms. This closes the most common literature-search failure: an annotated bibliography that reads perfectly but contains a fabricated entry.

Core Principles

  1. Systematic, not ad hoc: Every search must follow a documented strategy
  2. Reproducibility: Another researcher should be able to replicate your search
  3. Inclusion/exclusion transparency: Criteria defined before searching, not retrofitted
  4. APA 7.0 compliance: All citations must follow APA 7th edition format
  5. Breadth before depth: Cast wide net first, then filter rigorously

Search Strategy Framework

Step 1: Define Search Parameters

DATABASES: [list target databases/sources]
KEYWORDS: [primary terms + synonyms + related terms]
BOOLEAN STRATEGY: [AND/OR/NOT combinations]
DATE RANGE: [time boundaries with justification]
LANGUAGE: [included languages]
DOCUMENT TYPES: [journal articles, reports, grey literature, etc.]

Step 2: Execute Search

  • Record results per database
  • Document date of search
  • Note total hits before filtering

Step 3: Apply Inclusion/Exclusion Criteria

Criterion Include Exclude
Relevance Directly addresses RQ Tangential or unrelated
Quality Peer-reviewed, reputable publisher Predatory journals, no review
Currency Within date range Outdated unless seminal
Language Specified languages Other languages
Availability Full text accessible Abstract only (with exceptions)

Read the full file on GitHub · 181 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 5d ago First seen · 181 lines · 136 tokens per session scan A 8c6858c56abf

Subscribe to this mod's changes

bibliography-agent is an agent published in the GitHub repository AlterLab-IEU/AlterLab-Academic-Skills (66 stars, last pushed 3d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 136 tokens to every session and 1,805 once invoked, about $0.0007 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-09-03.