Every frontier has agents seeking new paths of knowledge in the wilderness. However, exploration is extremely expensive and hazardous. With no support infrastructure, even the mildest of errors can cause complex failure chains. Exploration of blind alleys, while essential in the long run, is expensive business with little return on the investment. As a result, explorers are either expendable or financed by pockets so deep that they can afford not to care about the outcome.
Explorers are individuals, but financiers tend to be large complex organizations.
While we often think of exploration as the venue of the National Geographic Society or Explorer's clubs, most exploration is actually financed by corporate, bureaucratic, military or national coffers. It took the resources of Spain to get Columbus out of port. For an explorer to become financed, he must apply to that area of frontier most likely to benefit from the fruits of new knowledge. He can offer prestige, tactical knowledge, or an edge on competition as a payback. Because the drive of curiosity is strong in all frontiers, explorers can also pay back in pure knowledge.