Troubleshooting¶

Empty results¶

If many searches return 0 results, try:

• Using broader search terms
• Expanding the date range
• Checking spelling of scientific terms
• Using alternative gene names or synonyms

Rate limiting errors (HTTP 429)¶

If pubmatrix() raises a RuntimeError after repeated 429 responses:

• Obtain and use an NCBI API key (api_key=...)
• Reduce n_workers or the size of your search matrix
• Increase n_tries to allow more retries with backoff

Long search times¶

For large matrices:

• Break the search into smaller sub-matrices
• Use a more specific daterange
• Set cache_dir so repeated runs skip already-fetched pairs
• Increase n_workers, within the NCBI rate limit