Mayuri Rege is a DST-INSPIRE Faculty in the Department of Microbiology at Ramnarain Ruia Autonomous College, Mumbai. She is one of the Young Investigators selected to attend YIM 2020 in Mahabalipuram. In this invited article, she writes about the importance of facing and learning from failure as a scientist, and how she tries to instil this value in the undergraduate students she teaches.

Sravanti Uppaluri and Divya Uma are faculty members at the Azim Premji University, Bengaluru. In this invited article, they write about their experience of working with undergraduates, and how how using research as a pedagogical tool enriches undergraduate education.

Anand Krishnan is a DST-INSPIRE Faculty Fellow at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune. In this article, he speaks about the various approaches that he has employed in his role as a teacher of organismal biology, in order to encourage students to think independently, creatively and scientifically.

In this invited piece, Mohammad Imtiyaj Khan writes about the pressing need for more effective training systems in pedagogy and research for new lecturers in the Indian University system, drawn from his own experience as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Biotechnology, Gauhati University.

Rama Krishna Kancha is an Assistant Professor at the Centre for Plant Molecular Biology (CPMB), Osmania University, Hyderabad. In this invited piece, he speaks about the influence and importance of research techniques in aiding the education of undergraduate and postgraduate students in Universities.