The Advanced Student's Corner

There's a lot of talk about coronavirus testing at the moment, but some people are getting confused about what they actually are. How is the antibody test different to the PCR antigen test? What do they do? And why are they important? Josh Toussaint-Strauss speaks with Professor David Smith to answer some of these covid-19 questions.

100 years ago, celebrations marking the end of the First World War were cut short by the onslaught of a devastating disease - the 1918-19 influenza pandemic. Its early origins and initial geographical starting point still remain a mystery but in the Summer of 1918, there was a second wave of a far more virulent form of the influenza virus than anyone could have anticipated. Soon dubbed ‘Spanish Flu’ after its effects were reported in the country’s newspapers, the virus rapidly spread across much of the globe to become one of the worst natural disasters in human history.  To mark the centenary and to highlight vital scientific research, the University of Cambridge has made a new film exploring what we have learnt about Spanish Flu, the urgent threat posed by influenza today, and how scientists are preparing for future pandemics.

  Coronavirus is nothing new: for centuries, infectious diseases have spread across the world. Their deadliness has been well documented - but have they altered the path of history? From the Plague of Justinian to the Black Death to the spread of cholera and the eventual eradication of smallpox, pandemics have made a profound impact. Did plague weaken the Byzantium Empire? Did the Black Death cause a social revolution in England? And what role did smallpox play in the birth of the United States? We speak to the historians Sir Richard J. Evans, Rebecca Rideal, Michael Bennett, Michael McCormick, Elizabeth Fenn, and Andrew Bailey.

  This video is all about the differences between UK English and US English. 

 Understand why Spanish speakers sound Spanish when speaking English with the help of Sofía Vergara.