skill
OmicsClaw
Conversational & memory-enabled AI research partner for multi-omics analysis. CLI + Desktop App (installers in Releases). From biological idea to full research paper.
Set up
Skills are installed by placing their folder where your agent loads skills.
Install instructions come from the README
README
synced Oct 14, 2026OmicsClaw is an AI agent for multi-omics analysis. You describe the analysis you want; the model picks a skill, reads its instructions and runs its Python, R or command-line tools in your own environment, on your machine or on a server. It ships 88 skills in seven domains, and the same agent answers in the terminal, in the desktop app and on chat platforms.
What's new
- Across seven domains, 83 skills expose function libraries and replayable examples; five remain CLI-only, including the demo-only XCMS stub, and Python/R modules support IO tracking and review before acceptance (0074, 0075, 0076).
- A real-model routing eval (
tests/evals/live/, run by hand) measures whether the model picks the right skill for 26 seed requests, the CI unit-test job now also runs the launch shell, attachments, top-level and desktop HTTP tests, and the four consensus skills whose scripts could not start have since been deleted (0068, 0070). - The agent framework has been rebuilt around three entry points,
oc cli,oc desktopandoc channel, and the oldoc interactive,oc tui,oc onboardandoc runcommands are gone (rebuild status). - Desktop v0.1.8 is available for macOS, Windows and Linux, with Desktop v3, SSH session recovery and an optional Independent review button below each completed reply.
- The agent tells you which of a skill's packages your environment lacks, and with
OMICSCLAW_SKILL_ENV=installit can install them after you approve, into a separate overlay that leaves the base environment untouched (0061).
Earlier entries are in CHANGELOG.md.
Quick start
git clone https://github.com/TianGzlab/OmicsClaw.git
cd OmicsClaw
bash 0_setup_env.sh # creates the OmicsClaw conda environment
conda activate OmicsClaw
oc cli --configure # choose a model provider and enter its API key
oc cli # chat in the terminal
oc cli --configure saves its answers to a .env file. It asks for one of 13
providers (DeepSeek, OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini, Qwen on DashScope, Ollama, any
OpenAI-compatible endpoint and others), the API key, the model, an optional
base URL, and the workspace directory the agent may read and write. The agent
loads skills from <workspace>/skills, so if the workspace is not the
checkout, also set OMICSCLAW_SKILLS_DIR=<checkout>/skills in .env.
oc cli --prompt "..." answers one question and exits. If oc is not on
PATH, use python omicsclaw.py cli.
Skills are ordinary scripts, so you can also run one without the agent:
make list # every skill, by domain
python skills/spatial/spatial-preprocess/spatial_preprocess.py --demo --output /tmp/omicsclaw_demo
Ways to use it
| Where | Start it with | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal | oc cli | Chat with the agent. /resume reopens an earlier conversation, /skills lists skills, /help lists the other commands |
| Desktop App | the App starts oc desktop | Chat, approvals and file viewing in a desktop window (below) |
| Remote server | oc desktop on the server | The App reaches it through its own SSH tunnel, so the data stays on the server (remote mode) |
| Chat platforms | oc channel --channels telegram | Owner-only text chat on Telegram, Feishu, Slack, Discord, DingTalk, QQ or Email. oc channel --list shows them. Set OMICSCLAW_APPROVAL_TIMEOUT_S in .env first, or it refuses to start |
| Skill scripts | python <skill directory>/<script>.py | One analysis without the agent. Each skill's SKILL.md documents its options |
Conversations and the agent's long-term notes are stored in
<workspace>/.omicsclaw/memory.db. MCP servers listed in
<workspace>/.mcp.json are connected at start-up, and their tools become
available to the agent.
The agent asks you before it runs a shell command, writes or edits a file,
goes to the web, or calls an MCP tool. In the terminal you can allow a call once, allow that tool for
the rest of the conversation, or always allow that exact call; /auto stops
the questions about ordinary work. Dangerous commands and changes to
.omicsclaw/ or .env are still asked about. The dangerous-command check
matches known patterns, and a command written to avoid them gets through, so if
you let the agent work unattended, run its commands in a container without
network access by setting OMICSCLAW_SANDBOX=docker and
OMICSCLAW_SANDBOX_IMAGE (see .env.example).
Desktop App
Download Desktop v0.1.8 for your platform below.
Check each download against the
SHA256SUMS.txt
published with it.
| Platform | Installer |
|---|---|
| macOS, Apple Silicon | OmicsClaw-0.1.8-arm64.dmg |
| macOS, Intel | OmicsClaw-0.1.8-x64.dmg |
| Windows, x64 or ARM64 | OmicsClaw.Setup.0.1.8-x64.exe, OmicsClaw.Setup.0.1.8-arm64.exe |
| Linux, x64 | AppImage, deb, rpm |
| Linux, ARM64 | AppImage |
The installer contains no Python. Remote mode connects to a server through SSH or a backend URL and needs no Python on the client. Local mode asks for an interpreter with OmicsClaw installed, normally the conda environment from the quick start:
conda run -n OmicsClaw python -c "import sys; print(sys.executable)"
In Local mode, the App starts oc desktop for the project you open, one backend per
project. The model comes from the backend's .env, which the App's Providers
page can edit; a change takes effect when the backend restarts. Troubleshooting
is in the App guide, and the HTTP contract
in docs/core-features/surfaces.md §8.
Independent module review is off by default. After a reply finishes, click
Independent review below it to review that reply's analysis and return
the findings in the same conversation. The click applies only to that review;
it does not enable reviews for later analyses. Use App v0.1.8 or later, update
the backend to include 1540fca7,
and restart oc desktop to use this control.
Installation
| Method | Command | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| conda (recommended) | bash 0_setup_env.sh | Python, R and the command-line tools the skills need, plus the Desktop backend |
| pip | pip install -e . | Terminal chat only. Most skills need packages that the conda environment provides, and the Desktop backend's FastAPI and uvicorn come from conda |
Chat platforms need their own SDKs: pip install -e ".[channels]" for
Telegram and Feishu, pip install slack-sdk aiohttp for Slack,
pip install discord.py for Discord, pip install httpx websockets for
DingTalk and pip install qq-botpy for QQ; Email uses only the standard
library. The dependency lists are environment.yml and
pyproject.toml.
Domains
88 skills in seven domains. make list prints the current index.
| Domain | Skills | Examples | Guide |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spatial transcriptomics | 17 | QC, domains, annotation, deconvolution, CNV, trajectory | spatial |
| Single-cell omics | 30 | QC, clustering, annotation, doublets, velocity, GRN | singlecell |
| Genomics | 10 | QC, alignment, variants, CNV, assembly, epigenomics | genomics |
| Proteomics | 8 | DIA/DDA, PTM, networks, biomarkers | proteomics |
| Metabolomics | 8 | Peaks, normalization, annotation, pathways | metabolomics |
| Bulk RNA-seq | 14 | DE, enrichment, co-expression, deconvolution, survival, cosinor rhythms | bulkrna |
| Literature | 1 | PDF, DOI, PubMed and GEO parsing, dataset handoff |
Documentation
The docs site is written in Chinese.
| Topic | Where |
|---|---|
| Quickstart | introduction/quickstart |
| Desktop App | ecosystem/omicsclaw-app |
| Remote mode | engineering/remote-execution |
| Domain guides | spatial · singlecell · genomics · proteomics · metabolomics · bulkrna |
| Safety and data privacy | data privacy · rules and disclaimer |
| Writing a skill | CONTRIBUTING.md · templates/skill/ |
| Framework design | docs/FRAMEWORK-REBUILD.md |
| Changelog | CHANGELOG.md |
Safety and data
Skills read and process your data in your own runtime, local or remote; the
model receives the conversation and what the tools return. OmicsClaw is a
research tool. It is not a medical device and gives no clinical diagnoses, so
have a domain expert check results before acting on them. On a server, keep
oc desktop bound to localhost and reach it through SSH; a non-loopback bind
requires OMICSCLAW_REMOTE_AUTH_TOKEN. See data privacy
and rules and disclaimer.
Community
Maintainers: Luyi Tian (Principal Investigator), Weige Zhou (Lead Developer), Liying Chen (Developer), and Pengfei Yin (Developer).
Issues · Discussions · Docs
Acknowledgments
The architecture, skill design and local-first approach are inspired by ClawBio, an early bioinformatics-native AI agent skill library. The memory and session-continuity patterns are inspired by Nocturne Memory.
Contributing
To add a skill, see CONTRIBUTING.md and the scaffold under
templates/skill/. For work on the framework itself, start
with AGENTS.md.
License
Apache-2.0. See LICENSE.
Citation
@software{omicsclaw2026,
title = {OmicsClaw: A Memory-Enabled AI Agent for Multi-Omics Analysis},
author = {Zhou, Weige and Chen, Liying and Yin, Pengfei and Tian, Luyi},
year = {2026},
url = {https://github.com/TianGzlab/OmicsClaw}
}