AMC Networks, the American television company behind hit television shows such as Breaking Bad, has teamed up with University of California, Irvine, to produce online courses linked to a popular TV show.

A course based on the post-apocalypse drama series The Walking Dead will be launched next month. Mr Josh Coates, head of Instructure, says it will present science and social sciences using the hook of a TV show and he describes the link between the university and the television industry as the "cross pollination" that comes with the Internet.

"This is real curriculum about infectious diseases, public health, nutrition, psychology and sociology. The fact that the context is this fictional world of an apocalypse is incidental."

Professor Alan Smithers, Director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham says such links with a popular TV show might work as a way of attracting students, but the academic element needs to outweigh the entertainment.

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