Ask individuals/teams to propose research projects that they want to work on. 1) What are you curious about? 2) How will you go about finding the answers you s

Ask individuals/teams to propose research projects that they want to work on. 1) What are you curious about? 2) How will you go about finding the answers you seek? 3) Why do you think this is important? Like YC core - focus more on the people, less on the ideas. Allow the ideas to change with the research journey. Self motivated curiosity leads to the best research. 'Funding agencies deciding what problems are important' is the broken piece of other research labs.