RD-Agent

What it is

RD-Agent is a Python project intended to automate industrial R&D processes by coordinating data-driven workflows through agents. The README describes multiple focus areas, including data mining, automatic reading of research papers, and autonomous model/data development, with demonstrations and a live demo link.

How it works

The project implements a framework with agents (R for proposing ideas and D for implementing them) to automate data-driven R&D tasks. It includes a data science workflow and a data-centric quant finance variant (RD-Agent(Q)). It supports multi-agent loops (e.g., data mining, model looping) and integration with LLM backends through LiteLLM, DeepSeek, and others. It provides a Quick Start with Docker, conda environments, and a dev setup for contributors. Health check commands and configuration options are described.

Getting started

• Docker installation recommended for demos: reference to docker run hello-world for verification.

• Conda environment creation:

  conda create -n rdagent python=3.10
  

• Activate the environment:

  conda activate rdagent
  

• Install RD-Agent (user):

  pip install rdagent
  

• Developer installation from source:

  git clone https://github.com/microsoft/RD-Agent
  cd RD-Agent
  make dev
  

• Health check:

  rdagent health_check --no-check-env
  

• Configuration mentions support for various chat/embedding models and backend options:

  • LiteLLM as default backend with multiple configuration approaches (Unified API base, separate chat/embedding bases).
  • DeepSeek experimental support with configuration example in .env.

Recent releases

• v0.8.0 (2025-11-03) with features such as add a rag mcp in proposal.
• v0.7.0 (2025-07-08) with features like add code change summary.
• v0.6.1 (2025-06-28) and v0.6.0 (2025-06-26) include bug fixes and async mechanisms for multi-trace.
• v0.5.0 (2025-06-18) includes features like add a check for NaN values in score_df.

Traction

• Stars: 14131
• Forks: 1808
• Open issues: 195

Behind the repo

• Organization: Microsoft
• Repository: RD-Agent
• License: MIT
• Language: Python
• Created: 2024-04-03
• Last push: 2026-08-04

Caveats

• Platform note: RD-Agent currently only supports Linux.
• Requires Docker for most demos; health check checks Docker installation and port occupancy.
• Development setup is described for contributors; active CI and pre-commit hooks are present in the repo.