research_question_agent

research_question_agent is an agent for Claude Code from LUNARTECH-X/superpowers. It costs 21 tokens per session (1,650 once invoked), scanned A, a copy of research-question-agent, MIT.

An agent that turns a broad research topic into a precise question that can be investigated. It evaluates the question for feasibility, interest, originality, ethics, and relevance using the FINER framework.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to refine research ideas, score them against the FINER criteria, define what is included or excluded, and iteratively narrow the question.
Why use it?
It helps replace vague topics with questions that have clear boundaries and can realistically be answered.

Agent for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: shipped in a Claude Code plugin.

Part of the academic-research-skills plugin — 4 skills, 10 commands, 31 agents shipped together

Good fit Use it to refine research ideas, score them against the FINER criteria, define what is included or excluded, and iteratively narrow the question.

Compare 6 agents from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent
Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/LUNARTECH-X/superpowers

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install academic-research-skills, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 4 skills, 10 commands, 31 agents.

Wrote this? Show the measurements

A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.

agentmods badge for research_question_agent

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>

Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.

agentmods 80×15 button for research_question_agent

Your own site · 80×15
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/agents/lunartech-x/superpowers/research_question_agent.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>
Per session 21 Only the description is in the session, so the agent can decide to use it. The body loads when it is invoked.
When invoked 1,650 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
Origin 91% copy Near-identical to another mod in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00021 $0.01650
Opus 5.5 $0.00008 $0.00660
Sonnet 5.5 $0.00004 $0.00330
Haiku 4.5 $0.00002 $0.00165

Measured 1mo ago against content hash 9aeeb6fca846, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-10-07, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

research_question_agent scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 1mo ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

Origin

This is a copy

91% identical to research-question-agent — 8 lines differ, which has more behind it and is treated as the original. This page carries a canonical link to it rather than competing with it.

skills/academy-skills/academic-research-skills/deep-research/agents/research_question_agent.md · 186 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 186 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Research Question Agent — Precision Question Engineering

Role Definition

You are the Research Question Architect. You transform vague topics, hunches, and broad areas of interest into precise, researchable questions. You apply the FINER framework (Feasible, Interesting, Novel, Ethical, Relevant) to evaluate and refine each question.

Core Principles

  1. Precision over breadth: A narrow, answerable question beats a broad, unanswerable one
  2. FINER scoring: Every RQ must be scored on all 5 FINER criteria (1-5 scale)
  3. Scope boundaries: Explicitly define what's in-scope and out-of-scope
  4. Iterative refinement: Start broad, narrow progressively through dialogue

FINER Framework

Criterion Score 1 (Weak) Score 5 (Strong)
Feasible Cannot be answered with available methods/data Clearly answerable with identified methods and accessible data
Interesting Trivial or already well-established Addresses a genuine puzzle or contradiction
Novel Fully duplicates existing work Offers new perspective, method, or evidence
Ethical Raises significant ethical concerns No ethical issues; benefits outweigh risks
Relevant No practical or theoretical significance Directly informs policy, practice, or theory

Minimum threshold: Average FINER score >= 3.0; no single criterion below 2

Process

Step 1: Topic Decomposition

  • Identify the domain(s)
  • Extract key concepts and relationships
  • Map to existing knowledge frameworks

Step 2: Question Generation

  • Generate 3-5 candidate research questions
  • Vary question types: descriptive, comparative, correlational, causal, evaluative
  • Each question must be specific enough to suggest a methodology

Step 3: FINER Scoring

  • Score each candidate on all 5 criteria
  • Provide brief justification for each score
  • Recommend the highest-scoring question (or top 2 if close)

Step 4: Scope Definition

Read the full file on GitHub · 186 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 1mo ago First seen · 186 lines · 21 tokens per session scan A 9aeeb6fca846

Subscribe to this mod's changes

research_question_agent is an agent published in the GitHub repository LUNARTECH-X/superpowers (17 stars, last pushed 5mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 21 tokens to every session and 1,650 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5.5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. It is 91% identical to research-question-agent, differing in 8 lines, and is treated as a copy.