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Learning to Retrieve from Agent Trajectories

sigir26-151 · Full research paper · Yuqi Zhou, Sunhao Dai, Changle Qu, Liang Pang, Jun Xu, Ji-Rong Wen
Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ra · 50% Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Repres · 25% Ranking Distillation and Adaptation · 25%
Abstract

Information retrieval (IR) systems have traditionally been designed and trained for human users, with learning-to-rank methods relying heavily on large-scale human interaction logs such as clicks and dwell time. With the rapid emergence of large language model (LLM) powered search agents, however, retrieval is increasingly consumed by agents rather than human beings, and is embedded as a core component within multi-turn reasoning and action loops. In this setting, retrieval models trained under human-centric assumptions can be mismatched with the way agents issue intermediate queries and consume results. In this work, we argue that retrieval models for agentic search should be trained directly from agent interaction data. We study learning to retrieve from agent trajectories as a trajectory-supervised training setting, where supervision is derived from multi-step agent interactions. Through a systematic analysis of search agent trajectories, we identify key behavioral signals that reveal document utility, including browsing actions, unbrowsed rejections, and post-browse reasoning traces. Guided by these insights, we propose LRAT, a simple yet effective framework that mines high-quality retrieval supervision from agent trajectories and incorporates relevance intensity through weighted optimization. To instantiate this setting at scale, we deploy the Tongyi-DeepResearch-30B model on 10K InfoSeekQA queries with four retrievers, collecting 26,482 agent trajectories and constructing 91,713 training pairs. Extensive experiments on both in-domain and out-of-domain deep research benchmarks demonstrate that retrievers trained with LRAT consistently improve evidence recall, end-to-end task success, and execution efficiency across diverse agent architectures and scales. Our results highlight agent trajectories as a practical and scalable supervision source for retrieval in agentic search.

Assigned reviewers

#ReviewerMatchWhy (closest evidence publications in the taxonomy)
1 Xinyu Ma 0001
56
86 Is ChatGPT Good at Search? Investigating Large Language Models as Re-Ranking Agents (2023) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
60 ReasonRank: Empowering Passage Ranking with Strong Reasoning Ability (2026) LLM-Based Reranking
53 PROP: Pre-training with Representative Words Prediction for Ad-hoc Retrieval (2021) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
2 Jurek Leonhardt
55
58 Data Augmentation for Sample Efficient and Robust Document Ranking (2024) Ranking Distillation and Adaptation
54 Efficient Neural Ranking using Forward Indexes (2022) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
54 Efficient Neural Ranking Using Forward Indexes and Lightweight Encoders (2024) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
3 Yuchen Li 0006
49
60 S2phere: Semi-Supervised Pre-training for Web Search over Heterogeneous Learning to Rank Data (2023) Web-Scale Learning to Rank
53 Retain to Refine: Adaptive Online Question Answering via Query Routing and Long-Short Memory (2026) Agentic and Deep Search RAG
49 GS2P: A Generative Pre-trained Learning to Rank Model with Over-parameterization for Web-Scale Search (Extended Abstract) (2024) Web-Scale Learning to Rank

Area chair

Area chairMatch
Fernando Diaz 0001 43
Area-chair candidates (7)
Chenyan Xiong COI: co-author 4715 papers
Kam-Fai Wong COI: co-author 446 papers
Xiaoxue Zang COI: co-author 444 papers
Fernando Diaz 0001 assigned 4312 papers
Hongjin Qian COI: co-author 4312 papers
Jun Xu 0001 COI: author 432 papers
Zhijing Wu 0001 439 papers

Candidates from the panel ranked by match score

#ReviewerMatchLoadWhy
1 Xinyu Ma 0001 assigned 56 3
86 Is ChatGPT Good at Search? Investigating Large Language Models as Re-Ranking Agents (2023) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
60 ReasonRank: Empowering Passage Ranking with Strong Reasoning Ability (2026) LLM-Based Reranking
2 Jurek Leonhardt assigned 55 3
58 Data Augmentation for Sample Efficient and Robust Document Ranking (2024) Ranking Distillation and Adaptation
54 Efficient Neural Ranking using Forward Indexes (2022) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
3 Shengyao Zhuang 55 3
75 R2LLMs: Retrieval and Ranking with LLMs (2025) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
72 Rank-R1: Enhancing Reasoning in LLM-based Document Rerankers via Reinforcement Learning (2026) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
4 Jing Liu 0022 COI: co-author 52 3
70 RocketQAv2: A Joint Training Method for Dense Passage Retrieval and Passage Re-ranking (2021) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
55 Dense Text Retrieval Based on Pretrained Language Models: A Survey (2024) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
5 Xueguang Ma 51 3
79 R2LLMs: Retrieval and Ranking with LLMs (2025) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
61 To Interpolate or not to Interpolate: PRF, Dense and Sparse Retrievers (2022) Query Reformulation and Expansion
6 Xiao Wang 0043 50 3
52 Unsupervised Dense Retrieval with Conterfactual Contrastive Learning (2026) Robustness and Adversarial IR
49 Neural Pseudo-Relevance Feedback Models for Sparse and Dense Retrieval (2022) Query Reformulation and Expansion
7 Ruqing Zhang 0001 COI: co-author 50 3
53 PROP: Pre-training with Representative Words Prediction for Ad-hoc Retrieval (2021) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
53 B-PROP: Bootstrapped Pre-training with Representative Words Prediction for Ad-hoc Retrieval (2021) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
8 Keping Bi 50 3
55 CAME: Competitively Learning a Mixture-of-Experts Model for First-stage Retrieval (2025) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
52 L2R: Lifelong Learning for First-stage Retrieval with Backward-Compatible Representations (2023) Efficient Retrieval and Indexing Systems › Others
9 Yuchen Li 0006 assigned 49 3
60 S2phere: Semi-Supervised Pre-training for Web Search over Heterogeneous Learning to Rank Data (2023) Web-Scale Learning to Rank
53 Retain to Refine: Adaptive Online Question Answering via Query Routing and Long-Short Memory (2026) Agentic and Deep Search RAG
10 Chen Zhao 0013 49 3
69 Rethinking Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval: Evaluating and Advancing Retrievers in Agentic Search Systems (2026) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
60 Multi-Step Reasoning Over Unstructured Text with Beam Dense Retrieval (2021) Multi-hop and Complex Reasoning QA
11 Sheng-Chieh Lin 48 3
52 Aggretriever: A Simple Approach to Aggregate Textual Representations for Robust Dense Passage Retrieval (2023) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
52 A Dense Representation Framework for Lexical and Semantic Matching (2023) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
12 Jingtao Zhan 48 3
55 Optimizing Dense Retrieval Model Training with Hard Negatives (2021) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
53 Scaling Laws For Dense Retrieval (2024) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
13 Daiting Shi COI: co-author 48 3
58 Pre-trained Language Model-based Retrieval and Ranking for Web Search (2023) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
53 Pre-trained Language Model for Web-scale Retrieval in Baidu Search (2021) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
14 Weiwei Sun 0001 47 3
86 Is ChatGPT Good at Search? Investigating Large Language Models as Re-Ranking Agents (2023) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
75 TourRank: Utilizing Large Language Models for Documents Ranking with a Tournament-Inspired Strategy (2025) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
16 Negar Arabzadeh 47 3
55 Learning Query-Space Document Representations for High-Recall Retrieval (2023) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
52 Predicting Efficiency/Effectiveness Trade-offs for Dense vs. Sparse Retrieval Strategy Selection (2021) Efficient Retrieval and Indexing
17 Sebastian Bruch 0001 47 3
55 An Analysis of Fusion Functions for Hybrid Retrieval (2024) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
49 Training Efficient Tree-Based Models for Document Ranking (2013) Web-Scale Learning to Rank
18 Venktesh V 45 3
53 The Surprising Effectiveness of Rankers trained on Expanded Queries (2024) Evidence Selection and Context Refinement
50 TagRec++: Hierarchical Label Aware Attention Network for Question Categorization (2024) Text Embedding and Representation Learning
19 Shuaiqiang Wang COI: co-author 45 3
54 Is ChatGPT Good at Search? Investigating Large Language Models as Re-Ranking Agents (2023) Text Embedding and Representation Learning
49 GS2P: A Generative Pre-trained Learning to Rank Model with Over-parameterization for Web-Scale Search (Extended Abstract) (2024) Web-Scale Learning to Rank
20 Adam Jatowt 45 3
75 BracketRank: Large Language Model Document Ranking via Reasoning-based Competitive Elimination (2026) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
58 TempRetriever: Fusion-based Temporal Dense Passage Retrieval for Time-Sensitive Questions (2026) Domain-Specific and Structured Retrieval
21 Zhen Qin 0001 45 3
58 Learning List-Level Domain-Invariant Representations for Ranking (2023) Ranking Distillation and Adaptation
58 Multi-Task Learning for Email Search Ranking with Auxiliary Query Clustering (2018) Domain-Specific and Structured Retrieval
22 Corby Rosset 45 3
51 Generic Intent Representation in Web Search (2019) Text Embedding and Representation Learning
44 Augmenting Zero-Shot Dense Retrievers with Plug-in Mixture-of-Memories (2023) Retrieval-Augmented Generation › Others
23 Andrew Parry 44 3
58 "In-Context Learning" or: How I learned to stop worrying and love "Applied Information Retrieval" (2024) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
46 Optimal Re-Ranking Depth (2026) Query Performance Prediction
25 Gustavo Penha 44 3
58 Curriculum Learning Strategies for IR (2020) Ranking Distillation and Adaptation
52 Online learning to rank for sequential music recommendation (2019) Search and Recommendation Integration
27 Antonio Mallia 44 3
46 Unveiling DIME: Reproducibility, Generalizability, and Formal Analysis of Dimension Importance Estimation for Dense Retrieval (2025) Query Reformulation and Expansion
45 Learning Passage Impacts for Inverted Indexes (2021) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
28 Tingyu Song 44 3
63 Rethinking Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval: Evaluating and Advancing Retrievers in Agentic Search Systems (2026) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
59 LimRank: Less is More for Reasoning-Intensive Information Reranking (2025) Evidence Selection and Context Refinement
29 Jialong Wu 0007 44 3
42 AdaRewriter: Unleashing the Power of Prompting-based Conversational Query Reformulation via Test-Time Adaptation (2025) Query Reformulation and Expansion
42 AdaCQR: Enhancing Query Reformulation for Conversational Search via Sparse and Dense Retrieval Alignment (2025) Query Reformulation and Expansion
30 Franco Maria Nardini 43 3
46 Expansion via Prediction of Importance with Contextualization (2020) Sparse and Dense Retrieval Encoders
45 Learning Early Exit Strategies for Additive Ranking Ensembles (2021) Learned Sparse Retrieval Efficiency
35 Armin Toroghi 43 3
55 Self-supervised Contrastive BERT Fine-tuning for Fusion-Based Reviewed-Item Retrieval (2023) Dense Bi-Encoder Training and Representation Learning
40 LogicRec: Recommendation with Users' Logical Requirements (2023) Knowledge Graph Embedding and Completion
36 Shu Zhou 0002 42 3
66 SCORE-RAG: Self-Correcting Exploration-Exploitation Retrieval for Multi-hop Question Answering (2026) Multi-Hop and Iterative Retrieval Reasoning
51 Why Knowledge Distillation Fails to Scale in Neural Retrieval (2026) Text Embedding and Representation Learning
37 Bowen Zheng 0005 COI: co-author 42 3
55 Autonomous Reasoning-Retrieval for Large Language Model Based Recommendation (2025) Reasoning-Intensive Retrieval and Ranking
41 Generative Recommender with End-to-End Learnable Item Tokenization (2025) Item Tokenization and Semantic IDs