esearch

Search pubmed for a query

$ esearch -db pubmed -query "[selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor]"

$ esearch -db [protein] -query '[Escherichia*]'

$ esearch -db nuccore -query "[insulin [PROT] AND rodents [ORGN]]"

$ esearch [-h|-help]

esearch [options]

esearch is a command-line tool for performing searches in NCBI's Entrez databases using indexed field queries. It provides programmatic access to major biological databases including PubMed (biomedical literature), GenBank (nucleotide sequences), Protein (protein sequences), and many others.
The tool is part of the NCBI EDirect (Entrez Direct) utilities suite, designed for automated retrieval and processing of biological data. esearch typically serves as the first step in a pipeline, identifying records that match search criteria. Its output is usually piped to other EDirect commands like efetch (to retrieve full records) or elink (to find related data across databases). This enables powerful automation of biological database queries in research workflows.

-db database

Database to search

Search query with optional field qualifiers

Display help

Part of the edirect package from NCBI. Requires internet connection. Output is typically piped to elink or efetch for further processing.

elink(1), efetch(1), einfo(1)