Whoever is paying for it, usually. Ideally, the existing body of knowledge helps find the next set of questions which need to be investigated. If your funding s

Whoever is paying for it, usually. Ideally, the existing body of knowledge helps find the next set of questions which need to be investigated. If your funding source doesn’t like your current set of questions, you reframe them or find a new set of questions. That’s why it’s important to have funding sources of all types, so different types of research topics get funded.