Overview
The Research Agent is an AI-powered interface that answers questions about global events in natural language. Ask questions in plain English and receive structured results drawn from GDELT’s media event clusters, entity profiles, and news domain data.How It Works
AI-powered analysis
The Research Agent understands your intent and determines which data to retrieve — media event stories, entity profiles, or domain information.
Data retrieval
The agent queries GDELT Cloud’s API to find matching media events, entities, and articles.
Example Questions
The Research Agent can answer a wide variety of questions about global events:Event & Story Queries
Entity Queries
Geographic & Thematic Queries
Features
Conversational Context
The Research Agent maintains conversation context, allowing follow-up questions:- Initial Question
- Follow-up 1
- Follow-up 2
You: What protests happened in France last week?Agent: Returns media event clusters about French protests with article links
Data Visualization
Results are displayed in structured formats:Story Cards
Media event clusters with headline, category, article count, and sentiment
Article Links
Source articles with titles, domains, and publication dates
Entity Profiles
People and organizations with linked stories and co-occurrences
Sentiment Metrics
Goldstein scale and tone scores indicating conflict/cooperation intensity
Understanding Results
Media Event Stories
Each story is a cluster of related articles. Results include:| Field | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
| cluster_label | Story headline | ”French workers stage nationwide strikes” |
| category | Topic category | politics_governance |
| scope | Geographic reach | national |
| article_count | Articles in the cluster | 47 |
| avg_goldstein | Conflict/cooperation (-10 to +10) | -5.0 |
| avg_tone | Sentiment score | -3.2 |
Entity Profiles
Entity results include:| Field | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
| display_name | Entity name | ”Emmanuel Macron” |
| type | Person or organization | person |
| total_articles | Articles mentioning this entity | 312 |
| linked_stories | Media event clusters involving the entity | 28 |
| co_occurrences | Other entities frequently mentioned alongside | ”Marine Le Pen”, “EU” |
Goldstein Scale
The Goldstein scale measures event cooperation/conflict intensity:- Cooperative (+5 to +10)
- Neutral (-4 to +4)
- Conflictual (-5 to -10)
- +10: Yield / major concession
- +8: Formal agreement
- +7: Consult / meet
- +5: Promise / pledge
Tips
Be specific about time
Include time ranges like “today”, “this week”, or “in January” for best results
Use categories
Ask about conflict, politics, economy, health, disaster, crime, society, or tech
Explore entities
Ask about specific people or organizations to see their full story profile
Follow up
Drill into specific stories or entities from initial results