Not sure what the technical term for this is, but after I search for something, open the entity and then press X or ESC, the search field is just empty. Which is not very user friendly.
I know there is an option to click on the very small “open in new panel” button which prevents this, and also that you can do option + enter to open it the same way. But for almost all people the expected default behaviour is just clicking on it.
I think it should always open in new panel by default, and thus not lose it’s search term.
As a side note, the use of TAB is not very intuitive when searching. After you have typed your term you want to maybe change the “what” dropdown by pressing tab once. But you have to press it 3 times before you get there.