We are progressively seeing the signs of a burgeoning mental health crisis in academia. In this new series, we will examine the status of mental health awareness and research in the Indian context, and discuss possible strategies and interventions to counter the issue. In this invited article, Hina Lateef Nizami writes about why we need to break free of the habit of normalizing poor mental health and burnout in academic circles.

In this next article in our series on interdisciplinary research, Siddharth Jhunjhunwala from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, discusses how all biomedical research carries an interdisciplinary component and how collaborative, multidisciplinary projects are rapidly becoming the new norm in science.

In this first article in our new series on interdisciplinarity, Gautam Menon, theoretical physicist (The Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Chennai & Homi Bhabha National Institute, Mumbai) and Sandhya P Koushika, neurobiologist (Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai) provide critical insights on tackling interdisciplinary problems, gained from a decade of steadfast collaboration.

In this second article in our series on research ethics, Praveen Chaddah, former director of the UGC-DAE Consortium for Scientific Research, writes about the issue of idea-plagiarism in competitive research, and how to avoid being a victim of the same while maintaining high ethical standards.

Nobel Laureate and University Professor at Columbia University, New York, Martin Chalfie shares some very valuable tips with graduate students applying for postdocs. This article was first published in SDB e-news, an electronic newsletter from the Society for Developmental Biology. Link