Topic

Works in OpenAlex are tagged with Topics using an automated system that takes into account the available information about the work, including title, abstract, source (journal) name, and citations.

Topics are grouped into subfields, which are grouped into fields, which are grouped into top-level domains. Each topic has one subfield, one field, and one domain, so each of these may also be used to classify the work, depending on the level of granularity you want.

Info

For further details about Topics objects, consult the OpenAlex documentation.

Topics models from OpenAlex API Schema definition.

Topic

Bases: DehydratedTopic

Labels which can be used to describe what a paper is about.

id instance-attribute

id: HttpUrl

The OpenAlex ID for this Topic.

display_name instance-attribute

display_name: str

The English-language label of the topic.

score instance-attribute

score: float

The strength of the connection between the work and this topic (higher is stronger).

domain instance-attribute

domain: TopicLevel

The highest level in the Topics structure.

field instance-attribute

field: TopicLevel

The second-highest level in the Topics structure.

subfield instance-attribute

subfield: TopicLevel

The third-highest level in the Topics structure.

ids instance-attribute

ids: TopicIDs

All the external identifiers for a Topic.

description instance-attribute

description: str

A description of this topic, generated by AI.

keywords instance-attribute

keywords: list[str]

Keywords consisting of one or several words each, meant to represent the content of the papers in the topic.

works_count instance-attribute

works_count: int

The number of works tagged with this topic.

cited_by_count instance-attribute

cited_by_count: int

The number of citations to works that have been tagged with this topic.

DehydratedTopic

Bases: BaseModel

Stripped-down Topic Model.

id instance-attribute

id: HttpUrl

The OpenAlex ID for this Topic.

display_name instance-attribute

display_name: str

The English-language label of the topic.

score instance-attribute

score: float

The strength of the connection between the work and this topic (higher is stronger).

domain instance-attribute

domain: TopicLevel

The highest level in the Topics structure.

field instance-attribute

field: TopicLevel

The second-highest level in the Topics structure.

subfield instance-attribute

subfield: TopicLevel

The third-highest level in the Topics structure.

TopicIDs

Bases: BaseModel

External identifiers for a Topic.

openalex instance-attribute

openalex: HttpUrl

The OpenAlex ID for this Topic.

wikipedia class-attribute instance-attribute

wikipedia: HttpUrl | None = None

This topic's Wikipedia page URL.

TopicLevel

Bases: BaseModel

Topic level information.

id instance-attribute

id: HttpUrl

ID for the topic level. For more info, consult the OpenAlex topic mapping table.

display_name instance-attribute

display_name: str

The English-language label of the level.