DBCLS
DBCLS · Life Sciences

TogoMCP

Model Context Protocol Server for Life Sciences Research

MCP Server Endpoint
https://togomcp.rdfportal.org/mcp

Summary

TogoMCP is a comprehensive Model Context Protocol (MCP) server developed by DBCLS that provides LLM agents with seamless access to a vast ecosystem of life sciences databases. It integrates over 20 major biological and biomedical databases, enabling AI assistants like Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini to help researchers query, explore, and integrate complex biological data using natural language.

Through SPARQL queries, RDF data exploration, and ID conversion services, TogoMCP bridges the gap between AI assistants and the rich data landscape of life sciences. Whether you're a biologist exploring disease–protein associations, a chemist searching for drug candidates, or a data scientist integrating information across multiple domains, TogoMCP provides a powerful toolkit for knowledge discovery.

🔬 Multi-Database Access

Query proteins, genes, chemicals, diseases, pathways, and more across 20+ integrated databases including UniProt, PubChem, ChEMBL, PDB, Reactome, ClinVar, and others — all through a single MCP endpoint.

🌐 SPARQL & RDF-Based

Built on Semantic Web technologies. TogoMCP exposes SPARQL endpoints from the RDF Portal, enabling precise, structured queries with rich cross-references between datasets.

🔗 ID Conversion

Powered by TogoID, the server converts identifiers across 65+ biological databases — including cross-category conversions (e.g., disease IDs → gene IDs) with semantic relationship annotations.

🤖 AI-Ready

Designed for integration with LLM-based assistants. Compatible with Claude Desktop, ChatGPT (Enterprise), and Gemini CLI. No bioinformatics expertise required — use natural language to explore data.

Usage Examples

The following examples illustrate how AI assistants powered by TogoMCP can tackle complex life sciences research questions by orchestrating queries across multiple databases.

1

Multi-Database Integration for Drug Discovery

Prompt Find proteins that are associated with both cardiovascular diseases and have known small molecule inhibitors in ChEMBL, and classify them according to disease and drug availability.

Response

The system executed a comprehensive multi-database search strategy, querying MeSH for cardiovascular disease terms, then searching ChEMBL for related drug targets, and running complex SPARQL queries to retrieve detailed bioactivity data. It compiled and classified 75+ cardiovascular protein targets with their inhibitors, development stages, and clinical outcomes into a structured report.

Tools Used

search_mesh_entity search_chembl_target get_MIE_file run_sparql list_databases

Key Results

  • 75+ human proteins associated with cardiovascular diseases identified and classified
  • 15+ validated hypertension targets with approved drugs (RAAS system, adrenergic receptors)
  • 20+ targets for coronary artery disease in various development stages
  • Ion channels: 60+ protein subtypes with inhibitors (sodium, calcium, potassium channels)
  • 50+ targets with approved drugs, 15+ targets in Phase 3 clinical trials
  • Notable failed programs identified: CETP, Lp-PLA2, p38 MAPK inhibitors
2

Enzyme Classification Analysis

Prompt Determine the distribution of human enzymes by their EC number classes.

Response

The system retrieved the UniProt database schema and executed targeted SPARQL queries to extract and analyze all human enzymes with EC number classifications from Swiss-Prot. Results were aggregated by EC class, percentages computed, and a visual distribution chart generated alongside a comprehensive analysis report.

Tools Used

get_MIE_file run_sparql

Key Results

  • Analyzed 4,442 unique human enzymes from UniProt Swiss-Prot
  • EC 2 – Transferases: 1,823 proteins (41.0%) — most abundant class
  • EC 3 – Hydrolases: 1,655 proteins (37.3%) — second most abundant
  • EC 1 – Oxidoreductases: 545 (12.3%); EC 4–7 together: ~9.4%
  • Transferases + Hydrolases account for 78.3%, reflecting importance of signaling & regulation
3

Comparative Chemical Analysis: Natural Products vs Synthetic Compounds

Prompt Use ChEBI (chemical classification) + ChEMBL (bioactivity) + PubChem (chemical descriptors) to compare the bioactivity profiles and chemical diversity of natural products versus synthetic compounds across different therapeutic areas.

Response

The system coordinated queries across three major chemical databases, retrieving schemas for ChEBI, ChEMBL, and PubChem. It executed cross-database SPARQL queries for natural product classification and bioactivity data, retrieved detailed molecular descriptors via PubChem, and synthesized the findings into a comparative report covering potency, structural diversity, and therapeutic area coverage.

Tools Used

get_MIE_file run_sparql get_compound_attributes_from_pubchem

Key Results

  • Natural Products (e.g., Vinblastine, Paclitaxel): 70% show IC50 < 100 nM, avg. 8 chiral centers, MW 400–900 Da, polypharmacology (8.5 targets avg.), ~60% of anticancer drugs derived from natural products
  • Synthetic Compounds (e.g., Imatinib, Omeprazole): 40% with IC50 < 100 nM, ~1 chiral center, MW 300–600 Da, monopharmacology (2–3 targets), dominant in cardiovascular, CNS, metabolic diseases
  • Natural products occupy unique, evolution-validated chemical space ideal for oncology
  • Optimal drug discovery strategy combines both: natural product scaffolds + medicinal chemistry optimization

Setup Guide

Connect TogoMCP to your AI assistant in minutes. Choose your platform below.

Method 1: Custom Connectors (Recommended — Claude Pro, Team, or Enterprise)

  1. Open Claude and navigate to Settings → Connectors.
  2. Click "Add custom connector" at the bottom of the page.
  3. Enter the MCP server URL: https://togomcp.rdfportal.org/mcp
  4. Click "Add" to complete the setup.
  5. In your chat interface, click the "Search and tools" button to enable the connector.

Method 2: JSON Configuration (Alternative — Claude Desktop App)

  1. Navigate to Settings → Developer → Edit Config. This opens claude_desktop_config.json.
  2. Add the following configuration:
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "togomcp": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "mcp-remote", "https://togomcp.rdfportal.org/mcp"]
    }
  }
}
  1. Save the file and restart Claude Desktop.
ℹ️ For more details, see the Claude custom connectors documentation.

ChatGPT — Business or Enterprise Plans Required

MCP connectors in ChatGPT are currently available for Business/Enterprise plans only.

  1. Go to Workspace Settings → Permissions & Roles and enable "Developer mode / Create custom MCP connectors".
  2. Navigate to Settings → Connectors → Create.
  3. Enter the following details:
    • Connector name: TogoMCP
    • MCP Server URL: https://togomcp.rdfportal.org/mcp
    • Description: Access to life sciences databases via TogoMCP
  4. Click "Create" and authorize the connector.
  5. In your chat, use the "+" menu to select "Developer Mode" and enable TogoMCP.
ℹ️ Developer mode requires confirmation for write actions and shows tool usage explicitly. See the ChatGPT MCP documentation for more details.

Gemini CLI — Streamable HTTP Configuration

TogoMCP uses Streamable HTTP transport (not SSE). Configure your settings.json as follows:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "togomcp": {
      "httpUrl": "https://togomcp.rdfportal.org/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Save the file — Gemini CLI will automatically detect the new MCP server on next launch.

ℹ️ For full setup instructions, see the Gemini CLI MCP documentation.

Available Databases

TogoMCP integrates over 20 major life sciences databases, covering proteins, genes, chemicals, diseases, pathways, taxonomy, and more.

UniProt
Comprehensive protein sequence and functional information. 444M+ proteins with curated Swiss-Prot entries, cross-references to 200+ databases, sequences, domains, and functions.
PubChem
Public chemical database with 119M compounds, 1.7M bioassays, molecular descriptors, bioactivity data, and links to genes, proteins, pathways, and diseases.
ChEMBL
Manually curated database of bioactive molecules with 2.4M+ compounds, 20M bioactivity measurements, and compound–target–activity data for drug discovery.
PDB (Protein Data Bank)
3D structural data for 204K+ protein and nucleic acid structures from X-ray crystallography, NMR, and cryo-EM. Linked to UniProt and EMDB.
ChEBI
Chemical Entities of Biological Interest ontology with 217,000+ entities. Hierarchical classification of small molecules, atoms, ions, functional groups, and biological roles.
Reactome
Curated knowledgebase of 22,000+ biological pathways across 30+ species, covering molecular interactions, biochemical reactions, complexes, and disease associations.
Rhea
Expert-curated database of 17,078 atom-balanced biochemical reactions, linked to ChEBI compounds, EC numbers, and metabolic pathway databases.
Gene Ontology (GO)
Controlled vocabulary for gene and gene product attributes across all organisms, covering biological processes, molecular functions, and cellular components.
Ensembl
Comprehensive genome annotations for 100+ species including genes, transcripts, proteins, and exons. Cross-referenced to UniProt, HGNC, and OMIM.
NCBI Gene
Gene database with 57M+ entries covering protein-coding genes, ncRNAs, and pseudogenes across all organisms, with chromosomal locations and orthology data.
ClinVar
Aggregates genomic variation and health relationships. 3.5M+ variant records with clinical interpretations, gene associations, and disease conditions.
MedGen
NCBI's portal for medical genetics with 233,000+ clinical concepts covering diseases, phenotypes, and clinical findings. Integrates OMIM, Orphanet, HPO, and MONDO.
MONDO
Monarch Disease Ontology integrating multiple disease databases into unified classification with cross-references to OMIM, Orphanet, DOID, MESH, ICD, and 35+ databases.
MeSH
NLM's Medical Subject Headings — controlled vocabulary for biomedical literature indexing, with hierarchical descriptors and qualifiers across 16 main categories.
NCBI Taxonomy
Biological taxonomic classification covering 3M+ organisms from bacteria to mammals, with hierarchical relationships, scientific names, and genetic code assignments.
PubMed
Bibliographic information for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, including publication metadata, abstracts, authors, and MeSH annotations.
PubTator
Biomedical entity annotations extracted from PubMed using text mining. Disease and Gene annotations linked to articles for literature-based knowledge discovery.
BacDive
Bacterial Diversity Metadatabase with 97,000+ strain records covering taxonomy, morphology, physiology, and molecular data for bacteria and archaea.
MediaDive
Culture media database from DSMZ with 3,289 standardized recipes for bacteria, archaea, fungi, and microalgae, including ingredients and growth conditions.
NANDO
Japanese intractable (rare) disease ontology with 2,777 disease classes, multilingual labels, and cross-references to international disease ontologies.
DDBJ
DNA Data Bank of Japan: nucleotide sequences with genomic annotations, organism metadata, taxonomic classification, and functional annotations.
GlyCosmos
Glycoscience portal integrating glycan structures, glycoproteins, glycosylation sites, glycogenes, and lectin–glycan interactions for multi-species glycobiology research.
AMR Portal
Antimicrobial resistance surveillance data with 1.7M+ phenotypic susceptibility tests and 1.1M+ genotypic AMR features from bacterial isolates worldwide.

Available Tools

TogoMCP exposes a rich set of tools for searching, querying, and converting life sciences data.

📋 Database & Information
list_databases
List all available databases with descriptions and coverage.
get_MIE_file
Get metadata file containing ShEx schema and SPARQL examples for a specific database. Use this first before writing queries.
get_sparql_endpoints
Retrieve available SPARQL endpoints from the RDF Portal.
get_sparql_example
Get example SPARQL queries for a specific database.
get_graph_list
List named graphs available in a given database.
🔍 Keyword Search Tools
search_uniprot_entity
Search UniProt proteins by name, description, or disease association.
search_chembl_molecule
Search ChEMBL molecules and bioactive compounds.
search_chembl_target
Search ChEMBL protein targets and drug targets.
search_pdb_entity
Search PDBj entries including structures, chemical components, and peptides.
search_reactome_entity
Search Reactome pathways and biological reactions.
search_rhea_entity
Search Rhea biochemical reactions by keyword.
search_mesh_entity
Search MeSH medical concepts, descriptors, and controlled vocabulary terms.
⚡ SPARQL Query
run_sparql
Execute custom SPARQL queries on any RDF database in the portal. For best results, use get_MIE_file first to understand the database schema and available properties.
🔄 ID Conversion (TogoID)
togoid_convertId
Convert identifiers between databases (e.g., UniProt to ChEMBL, PubChem to ChEBI).
togoid_countId
Count how many IDs can be converted between two databases.
togoid_getAllDataset
Get configuration for all available datasets in TogoID.
togoid_getDataset
Get configuration details for a specific TogoID dataset.
togoid_getAllRelation
Get all possible conversion relationships between databases.
togoid_getRelation
Get relationship details between two specific databases.
🧬 NCBI E-utilities
ncbi_esearch
Search NCBI databases (Gene, Taxonomy, ClinVar, MedGen, PubMed, PubChem) using NCBI field tags.
ncbi_esummary
Get summary information for NCBI IDs retrieved via esearch.
ncbi_efetch
Fetch full records (sequences, data, etc.) for NCBI IDs.
ncbi_list_databases
List all supported NCBI databases with descriptions and example queries.
🧪 PubChem-specific
get_pubchem_compound_id
Look up a PubChem compound ID from a compound name.
get_compound_attributes_from_pubchem
Retrieve detailed compound attributes and molecular descriptors from PubChem RDF.

Other MCP Servers

TogoMCP works excellently in combination with these complementary MCP servers for richer research workflows.

PubDictionaries MCP Server

PubDictionaries provides text annotation services for biomedical literature, helping identify and map biological entities such as genes, proteins, diseases, and chemicals in text.

Use Case: Annotate research papers to extract entity mentions, then use TogoMCP to retrieve comprehensive data about those entities from UniProt, ChEMBL, or other databases.

PubMed MCP Server

The PubMed MCP server provides access to the world's largest biomedical literature database, enabling article search, metadata retrieval, and full-text access from PubMed Central.

Use Case: Search PubMed for relevant literature, then use TogoMCP to retrieve detailed molecular and pathway information about entities mentioned in those papers.

OLS4 MCP Server

The Ontology Lookup Service (OLS4) from EMBL-EBI provides access to biomedical ontologies, enabling standardization of terminology and exploration of hierarchical relationships between biological concepts.

Use Case: Explore ontology terms and their relationships in OLS4, then query TogoMCP using standardized ontology identifiers for precise data retrieval.

Related Resources

Explore the ecosystem of tools and organizations behind TogoMCP.

RDF Portal

https://rdfportal.org

The NBDC RDF Portal is a comprehensive repository of semantic life sciences data developed by DBCLS and NBDC. It hosts 21+ RDF datasets comprising over 45.5 billion triples, all quality-reviewed for interoperability and SPARQL queryability. TogoMCP's SPARQL queries run against this portal's unified endpoint.

TogoID

https://togoid.dbcls.jp

TogoID is an identifier conversion service by DBCLS that bridges 65+ life science databases. Unlike traditional converters, it supports cross-category conversions (e.g., disease IDs → gene IDs) with semantic relationship annotations. TogoMCP's ID conversion tools are powered by TogoID's API.

DBCLS

https://dbcls.rois.ac.jp/en/

The Database Center for Life Science (DBCLS) is a Japanese research institute under ROIS, founded in 2007. It conducts research on database integration, Semantic Web technologies, and bioinformatics resources. DBCLS organizes the annual BioHackathon and monthly SPARQLthon events, and develops tools like TogoID, TogoTV, and TogoMCP.

Source Code

dbcls/togomcp

The TogoMCP source code is open and available on GitHub. Contributions, bug reports, and feature requests are welcome.

https://github.com/dbcls/togomcp