API for NCBI Genes

This API provides access to information about human genes, taken from NCBI's Gene dataset.

Source file: gene_info.gz (version date: )

This processed data only includes the human gene data from NCBI's gene database. This service is provided "as is" and free of charge. Please see the Frequently Asked Questions page for more details on terms of service, etc.

API Demo

The following demo shows how this API might be used with an autocompleter we've developed. (Example: Try typing NM.)

Customize

For further experimentation with the autocompleter and this API, try the autocompleter demo page.

API Documentation

API Base URL: https://clinicaltables.nlm.nih.gov/api/ncbi_genes/v3/search (+ query string parameters)

This data set may also be accessed through the FHIR ValueSet $expand operation.

In addition to the base URL, you will need to specify other parameters. See the query string parameters section below for details.

Query String Parameters and Default Values

At a minimum, when using the above base URL, you will need to specify the "terms" parameter containing a word or partial word to match.

Parameter Name	Default Value	Description
terms		(Required.) The search string (e.g., just a part of a word) for which to find matches in the list. More than one partial word can be present in "terms", in which case there is an implicit AND between them.
maxList	7	Optional, with a default of 7. Specifies the number of results requested, up to the upper limit of 500. If present but the value is empty, 500 will be used. Note that this parameter does not support pagination, see "count" and "offset" below for details on pagination support.
count	7	The number of results to retrieve (page size). The maximum count allowed is 500, see "offset" below on pagination support.
offset	0	The starting result number (0-based) to retrieve. Use offset and count together for pagination. Note that the current limit on the total number of results that can be retrieved (offset + count) is 7,500. We reserve the right to decrease or increase this limit based on system capacity and/or other factors. Please see the FAQ page on how to sign up to our email list to be notified of any changes or new features.
q		An optional, additional query string used to further constrain the results returned by the "terms" field. Unlike the terms field, "q" is not automatically wildcarded, but can include wildcards and can specify field names. See the Elasticsearch query string page for documentation of supported syntax.
df	_code_system, _code, chromosome, Symbol, description, type_of_gene	A comma-separated list of display fields (from the fields section below) which are intended for the user to see when looking at the results. The parameter "ef" (see below) may also be used to specify the data fields to retrieve. The main difference is that the value of "df" is always a string (for display), while the value for "ef" could be a json object when the field value has a complex structure.
sf	All fields	A comma-separated list of fields to be searched.
cf	GeneID	A field to regard as the "code" for the returned item data.
ef		A comma-separated list of additional fields to be returned for each retrieved list item. (See the Output format section for how the data for fields is returned.) If you wish the keys in the returned data hash to be something other than the field names, you can specify an alias for the field name by separating it from its field name with a colon, e.g., "ef=field_name1:alias1,field2,field_name3:alias3,etc. Note that not every field specified in the ef parameter needs to have an alias. The parameter "df" (see above) may also be used to specify the data fields to retrieve. The main difference is that the value of "df" is always a string (for display), while the value for "ef" could be a json object when the field value has a complex structure.

NCBI Genes Field Descriptions

(Field descriptions were based on the NCBI Gene REAMDE file.)

Field	Field Description
GeneID	The unique identifier for a gene.
HGNC_ID	The HGNC identifier for the gene, if one was provided in the dbXrefs field.
Symbol	The default symbol for the gene
Synonyms	A bar-delimited set of unofficial symbols for the gene
dbXrefs	A bar-delimited set of identifiers in other databases for this gene. The unit of the set is database:value.
chromosome	The chromosome on which this gene is placed. For mitochondrial genomes, the value 'MT' is used.
map_location	The map location for this gene (i.e. the cytogenetic location).
description	A descriptive name for this gene.
type_of_gene	The type assigned to the gene according to the list of options provided in https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/IEB/ToolBox/CPP_DOC/lxr/source/src/objects/entrezgene/entrezgene.as.
na_symbol	The symbol from a nomenclature authority. When this is not '-', it indicates that this symbol is from a nomenclature authority.
na_name	The full name from a nomenclature authority. When this is not '-', it indicates that this full name is from a nomenclature authority.
Other_designations	A pipe-delimited set of some alternate descriptions that have been assigned to a GeneID. '-' indicates none are reported.
Modification_date	The last date a gene record was updated, in YYYYMMDD format.
_code_system	The records in this API may have multiple unique IDs, e.g., NCBI GeneID and HGNC_ID (for about half of the records). This _code_system field indicates which ID system (aka, code system) is being used for the record, see _code field below for more details. This field is not in the original source data and is not searchable.
_code	The records in this API may have multiple unique IDs, e.g., NCBI GeneID and HGNC_ID (for about half of the records). The _code field contains a unique ID of the record based on the 'cf' parameter (specified in the request or default). The _code_system field (details see above) indicates which ID system (aka, code system) the _code value is from. This field is not in the original source data and is not searchable.

Output format

Output for an API query is an array of the following elements:

The total number of results on the server, which can be more than the number of results returned. This reported total number of results may also be significantly less than the actual number of results and is limited to 10,000, which may significantly improve the service response time.
An array of codes for the returned items. (This is the field specified with the cf query parameter above.)
A hash of the "extra" data requested via the "ef" query parameter above. The keys on the hash are the fields (or their requested aliases) named in the "ef" parameter, and the value for a field is an array of that field's values in the same order as the returned codes.
An array, with one element for each returned code, where each element is an array of the display strings specified with the "df" query parameter.
An array, with one element for each returned code, where each element is the "code system" for the returned code. Note that only code-system aware APIs will return this array.

Sample API Queries

Query	Result	Description
https://clinicaltables.nlm.nih.gov/api/ncbi_genes/v3/search?terms=MTX	[5,["4580","105616916","10651","4581","345778"],null,[ ["1","4580","HGNC:7504","MTX1","metaxin 1","protein-coding"], ["5","105616916","HGNC:50545","LINC01455","long intergenic non-protein coding RNA 1455","ncRNA"], ["2","10651","HGNC:7506","MTX2","metaxin 2","protein-coding"], ["1","4581","HGNC:7505","MTX1P1","metaxin 1 pseudogene 1","pseudo"], ["5","345778","HGNC:24812","MTX3","metaxin 3","protein-coding"]]]	Returns all five genes matching MTX. The number 5 is the total available result count, which in this case is also the number returned. The following array contains the GeneID values for the genes, the subsequent "null" means no extra was requested (via the ef parameter), and the last array contains the display fields for the list items, which in this case are: chromosome, GeneID, HGNC_ID, Symbol, description, and type_of_gene.