Episode 25 University Challenge

APPLAUSE

Asking the questions - Jeremy Paxman.

And so we reach the quarterfinals.

Out of the 130 or so teams who applied to compete in this contest,

28 made it to the first round,

16 entered the second round

and now only eight remain. They're...

At this stage of the competition,

the rule devised by Torquemada in the 1480s

demands that a team must win two matches

in order to reach the semifinals.

Lose two matches and you go home.

A team that wins one match but loses another has to play again

and win to qualify.

From now on, the questions get just a little bit harder.

The team from Bristol University have reached this stage

without being greatly troubled by their opponents,

beating Trinity College Cambridge by 230-95 in round one

and, the last time we saw them, sending home Trinity College Oxford

by 205-100.

Their average age is 22.

Let's meet them again.

Hi, I'm Ollie Bowes, I'm from Market Harborough in Leicestershire

and I'm studying music.

I'm Kirsti Biggs, I'm originally from Southampton

and I'm doing a PhD in mathematics.

And this is their captain.

Hi, I'm Sam Hosegood, I'm from Bedford

and I do chemical physics.

Hi, I'm Dom Hewett, I'm from Stroud in Gloucestershire

and I study English.

APPLAUSE

Now, the team from Newcastle University have arrived here

without being unduly vexed by Sheffield Hallam University,

whom they beat in round one by 170-40,

or by their second round opponents, the University of Southampton,

whom they dispatched with a margin of 215-130.

With an average age of 29,

let's meet the Newcastle team again.

Hi, my name's Jack Reynard, I'm from Leeds and I'm studying medicine.

I'm Molly Nielsen, I'm from London and I'm studying medicine.

And here's their captain.

Hi, I'm Jonathan, from Newcastle upon Tyne

and I'm studying for a PGCE.

Hi, my name's Adam Lowery,

I'm from Sunderland and I'm reading chemistry.

APPLAUSE

Right, let's just get on with it, then. Fingers on the buzzers.

Here's your first starter for ten.

The phrase "that sharp female newly born" refers to what device

in Dickens' A Tale Of Two Cities?

The guillotine.

Correct. APPLAUSE

You get a set of bonuses on an author, Bristol.

Firstly, the September 2016 update to the Oxford English Dictionary

marked the centenary of the birth of which British author

with revised entries of several words including frightsome,

splendiferous and human bean?

-Is that...

-Roald Dahl.

-Roald Dahl.

-Correct.

Originally a dialect word meaning stingy, what word developed

in American usage to mean scrupulous and then stylish or smart?

Dahl brought it to a wider audience in its sense of delicious

or enjoyable, for example in James And The Giant Peach.

-Scrumptious?

-Scrumptious.

-Scrumptious.

-Indeed.

Appearing in the title of his first novel published in 1943,

what word did Dahl, an RAF pilot,

popularised in its sense of a mischievous sprite,

imagined as the cause of mishaps to aircraft?

-Gremlin?

-Gremlin.

-Gremlin.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE Ten points for this.

Which African country's

lowest elevation is about 1,400 metres, higher...

Djibouti.

No, you lose five points.

Higher than the summit of Ben Nevis?

Around the size of Wales, Devon and Cornwall combined,

it gained independence from Britain in 1966

and is entirely surrounded by the Republic of South Africa.

-Lesotho.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses, Bristol, are on temporary capital cities.

Which city was designated the temporary capital of Lithuania

between 1920 and '39, Vilnius being under Polish control?

Do you know any other cities...?

-No, sorry.

-It's Kaunas.

Secondly, which city on the river Loire briefly

acted as the seat of the French government

in June 1940 because of the imminent invasion of Paris, before another

temporary capital was established at Vichy the following month?

-Nantes.

-Nantes?

-Nantes or Lyon.

-Nantes.

-No, it was Tours.

And finally, which port in South Korea was

named as its country's temporary capital during the Korean War?

It was one of the few large cities in the south not be

occupied by North Korean forces.

Incheon.

Incheon. Incheon.

No, it's Busan. Ten points for this.

Which prominent character in the Harry Potter world has a given

name that derives from that of the Greek messenger of the gods?

She shares this name with the queen of...

-Hermione.

-Hermione is right.

APPLAUSE

Your first bonuses, Newcastle, are on star clusters.

M13 in the constellation Hercules is an example of what

type of star cluster?

In contrast to open clusters,

they may have many thousands of stars, held

together by gravity in a relatively dense spherical arrangement.

-Globular cluster.

-Correct.

Containing the star Alcyone

and also known as the Seven Sisters,

which open star cluster in the constellation Taurus is named

after the daughters of the Titan Atlas in Greek mythology?

-The Pleiades.

-Correct.

Praesepe, also known as the Beehive Cluster,

is a major open star cluster

located in which other zodiacal constellation?

-Cancer.

-Correct. APPLAUSE

Ten points for this. Work this out before you buzz.

Using a UK standard computer keyboard,

what is the result of multiplying together the three numbers

that share a key with the pound sign, the dollar sign

and the percentage sign?

-60.

-60 is correct.

APPLAUSE Three by four by five.

These bonuses are on a painting technique, Newcastle.

What name is commonly given to the painting technique

prominent in neo-impressionism that uses dots of colour

which from a distance visually blend together?

-Pointillism.

-Correct.

The term peinture au point was coined in 1886 by the critic

Felix Feneon to refer to the works of which artist?

His paintings in the pointillist manner include Bathers At Asnieres.

Cezanne.

Pointillist? It has to be Seurat.

Seurat? Yeah. Seurat?

Seurat is correct.

Which post-impressionist painter moved to Asnieres in 1887

and adopted pointillist techniques

in many of his works, notably in his self-portrait of 1887,

now in the Art Institute of Chicago?

Is it van Gogh?

-Would you say van Gogh?

-Yes.

-Yeah?

-I think it is.

-Van Gogh?

Correct. APPLAUSE

We're going to take a picture round now.

For your picture starter, you're going to see a map of the early

Holy Roman Empire with one of its German stem duchies highlighted.

Ten points if you can identify the duchy.

Schleswig.

Anyone like to buzz from Newcastle?

Holstein.

No, it's Saxony. So picture bonuses in a moment or two.

Ten points at stake for this starter question. Fingers on the buzzers.

What's being described?

Moko is the form practised by the Maori people,

while a traditional style associated with the Japanese yakuza is...

Tattoos.

Tattoos is correct, yes. APPLAUSE

So we follow on from Saxony in the picture starter with three

more stem duchies that formed the early kingdom of Germany

and the Holy Roman Empire.

Five points for each you can correctly identify.

Firstly, the duchy marked A.

It's around, like, modern-day Baden-Wurttemberg.

So would it be...Baden or... I don't know.

Baden or Baden-Wurttemberg.

Baden.

Now, it's Swabia.

Secondly, the duchy marked B.

Any ideas?

Erm...

Rhineland.

No, that's Franconia.

And finally, the duchy marked C.

-Bavaria.

-Bavaria.

It is Bavaria, yes. APPLAUSE

Right, ten points for this.

A group of infectious diseases caused by Rickettsia bacteria

and transmitted by lice, fleas, mites or ticks,

which disease is associated with overcrowded and unhygie...?

Typhus.

Typhus is correct. APPLAUSE

OK, you get a set of bonuses on insects, Newcastle.

With more than 100,000 species and including bees,

wasps and ants, which insect order has a name meaning membrane wings?

-I'll nominate you. Hymenoptera.

-Hymenoptera.

-Hymenoptera.

-Correct.

Including dragonflies and damselflies,

which order of more than 5,000 species has a name

derived from the Greek word for tooth?

THEY WHISPER

-Dentoptera.

-Dentoptera?

-Dentoptera.

-No, they're odonata.

And finally, including the caddisflies,

which insect order has a name that means hairy-winged?

THEY WHISPER

Trichoptera?

-Say it again.

-Trichoptera.

-Trichoptera.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE Ten points for this.

In 1791, what seven-letter word did the revolutionary Bourbon Prince

Louis Philippe Joseph, Duke of Orleans adopt as his byname?

The same word forms part of a tripartite motto closely

associated with the French Revolution.

Egalite.

Correct. APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on the novels of Saul Bellow.

Firstly for five points, The Adventures Of Augie March

fictionalises a real-life incident in which Bellow

arrived in Mexico too late to see which exile who was murdered

the morning they were due to meet?

-Trotsky.

-Trotsky?

-Trotsky.

-Trotsky?

-Yeah.

-Leon Trotsky.

-Correct.

Bellow's final novel, Ravelstein, fictionalised the life

of which US philosopher?

He wrote the provocative 1987 work The Closing Of The American Mind.

-I don't know.

-Oh!

Rawls? John Rawls? No?

-What?

-John Rawls is a...

-Yeah.

John Rawls.

No, it was Allan Bloom.

"If I'm out of my mind, it's all right with me."

This is the opening thought of which of Bellow's title characters,

a Jewish intellectual in a novel of 1964?

-Herzog.

-Herzog is right.

APPLAUSE Ten points for this.

What four-letter word denotes the Hindu festival commemorating

the triumph of...

-Holi.

-Holi is correct, yes.

APPLAUSE

These bonuses are on logic, Newcastle.

In mathematical logic,

what name is given to a composed statement that is always true,

regardless of the truth of the partial statements

used in its composition?

-Sorry?

-Law.

-I don't know.

-Is that what you reckon as well?

-Do you know?

-Law.

-Law.

-It's tautology.

Born in 1806,

which English mathematician gives his name to the so-called law

or logical relation that can be expressed as the negation

of A or B is equivalent to not A and not B?

Boole.

Boole or...

Boole.

No, it's De Morgan.

And finally, what two-word Latin phrase is used for the logical rule

that states that if A is true and A implies B, then B is true?

-SHE WHISPERS INAUDIBLY

-No, no, it's a Latin two-word

-phrase.

-Oh, sorry. Sorry.

-You don't know?

-No, no, no.

Don't know? Sorry, we don't know.

The modus ponens.

Ten points for this.

Which genus of the pea family links

an influential sutra of Mahayana Buddhism,

a Baha'i temple in New Delhi,

a tribe encountered by Odysseus

and his men during their return from Troy and a position in yoga?

-Lotus.

-Lotus is correct.

APPLAUSE

Your bonuses are on molecular biology.

What term is defined as the entire complement of proteins

of a cell, tissue or organism at a particular time?

HE GROANS

No, sorry. No idea.

It's a proteome.

From the Greek for to move, what term denotes an enzyme that adds

phosphate groups to other molecules, for example proteins and lipids?

THEY WHISPER

A transfer?

No, it's a kinase.

And finally, phosphate groups are one of the building blocks

of the nucleotide ATP. For what do those letters stand?

-Adenosine triphosphate.

-Correct. APPLAUSE

We're going to take a music round now. For your music starter,

you'll hear a piece of classical music by an American composer.

Ten points if you can identify that composer.

PIANO MUSIC PLAYS

Glass.

It is Philip Glass, yes. APPLAUSE

It's the Opening of Glassworks.

The minimalist composer Philip Glass celebrated his 80th birthday

earlier this year. For your music bonuses,

three more composers who have written music in a minimalist form.

For five points, in each case simply give me the name of the composer.

Firstly...

ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYS

Steve Reich.

Steve Reich.

It is Terry Riley, I'm afraid.

Secondly, I want the name of this contemporary British composer.

ELECTRONIC MUSIC PLAYS

Nominate Bowes.

Birtwistle.

No, that's Anna Meredith.

And finally...

# Come out to show them

# Come out to show them

# Come out to show them Come out to show them... #

-Steve Reich.

-Right.

We'll try Steve Reich again.

It is, yes. Well done.

APPLAUSE Ten points for this.

Listen carefully.

In increasing order of orbital radius, the initial

letters of the inner moons of which planet spell out the word met?

Titan. Oh, Saturn.

Well, I'm sorry, I've got to take the first answer you give

and you said Titan.

-Saturn.

-Saturn is correct, yes.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

Your bonuses, this time, Bristol, are on mothers,

specifically those who've given birth to two kings of England

or Great Britain.

In each case, listen to the description and name the queen

and both her crowned progeny.

Firstly, born circa 1132, died in 1204,

probably at Fontevraud at Anjou.

-Eleanor of Aquitaine.

-And Henry the...

-Henry II?

-Richard I and John.

OK, can I nominate you?

-So...

-Eleanor of Aquitaine, Richard...

-Nominate Bowes.

-Eleanor of Aquitaine, Richard I and John.

Correct. Secondly, born in Paris in 1609, died in 1669 near Paris.

Oh. Henrietta Marie,

Charles I, James II.

Sorry, erm, Charles II, James II.

Henrietta Marie, Charles II, James II.

Yes, Henrietta Maria. Yes.

And finally, born at Mirow in north Germany in 1744

and died at Kew Palace in 1818.

It's George IV and Henry IV but I can't remember her name.

-Is it...

-Catherine.

-Catherine, yeah, I was thinking...

George IV, Henry IV, Catherine.

Right, Catherine, George IV, William IV.

Charlotte of Mecklenburg with George IV and William IV.

Ten points for this.

A manor house in the Cotswolds, villages in Somerset

and Huntingdonshire...

-Four Quartets.

-Four Quartets is right.

APPLAUSE

Your bonuses are on politics and social science.

In each case, give the single word that completes these titles.

All three answers and end in the letters I-S-M.

First, Roger Scruton's 2006 work

A Political Philosophy - Arguments For what?

-Conservatism.

-Conservatism.

Conservatism is correct.

Secondly, complete the title based on a website project,

Laura Bates' 2014 work Everyday what?

Feminism.

-No, it's sexism.

-Oh.

-Sorry.

And finally, Slavoj Zizek's 2014 work

Absolute Recoil - Towards A New Foundation Of Dialectical what?

Materialism?

-Materialism.

-Materialism is right.

Ten points for this. APPLAUSE

I need a precise number here.

The human body has how many thoracic vertebrae?

Nine.

Anyone like to buzz from Newcastle?

-12.

-12 is correct, yes.

APPLAUSE

Your bonuses, Newcastle, are on genetics.

From the Greek for many forms, what term describes cells with

more than the normal diploid set of chromosomes?

-Polymorphs.

-No, they're polyploid.

Secondly, extracted from autumn crocus,

what agent may be used to induce polyploidy in plants?

It's colchicine.

It's colchicine.

-HE WHISPERS INAUDIBLY

-Do you know what it is?

-No.

-No.

Colchicine.

Colchicine.

Col-kye-cine, I think it's normally called. Yes.

And finally, if colchicine inhibits 'microcubule' formation,

to which protein does colchicine bind to achieve this effect?

-Tubulin.

-Yeah, that's a good shout.

What do you think about tubulin?

Causes gout.

It causes gout...

I think it's tubulin.

It causes gout.

Yeah, tubulin.

What did you say about gout?

-It causes gout... Jack, what you saying?

-Come on.

-Tubulin.

-Tubulin.

-Tubulin is correct.

APPLAUSE Ten points for this.

What surname links the author of Death In The Afternoon

with the founders of the fashion house Red Or Dead?

Christie?

No, anyone like to buzz from Bristol?

-Smith.

-No, it's Hemingway. Ten points for this.

Similar to the bilberry,

plants of the genus Gaylussacia have what common name?

It's the forename of an enduring figure of American literature...

-Huckleberry.

-Huckleberry is right.

APPLAUSE

You get a set of bonuses on battles of the Civil War.

Firstly for five, taking place on the evening of July the 2nd 1644,

what is often cited as being the largest battle

fought on English soil?

-Edgehill, Edgehill.

-Edgehill, yeah. Yeah.

-Edgehill.

-No, it's Marston Moor.

In March 1646,

the last royalist field army was destroyed at which battle in

Gloucestershire, effectively marking the end of the First Civil War?

THEY WHISPER

-Tewkesbury.

-Tewkesbury.

Was there one then?

The War of the Roses one...

-Tewkesbury's the War of the Roses... OK. Go for it.

-OK.

-Tewkesbury.

-No, that was at Stow-on-the-Wold.

-Tewkesbury, I think, was in the Second Civil War.

-Yeah.

Which decisive parliamentarian victory of 1648 was

the largest battle of the Second Civil War?

It takes its name from a city in central Lancashire.

-Preston.

-Oh, yeah. Preston.

Preston is correct. APPLAUSE

Right, we're going to take the second picture round now.

For your picture starter, you'll see a painting of a mythological figure.

For ten points, I want you to identify that figure.

Andromeda.

It is Andromeda, yes, by Dore. APPLAUSE

Chained to a rock as an offering to the sea monster Cetus

before her rescue by Perseus.

For your bonuses, three more depictions of Andromeda.

In each case, I want the name of the artist for five points.

Firstly, this French artist.

WHISPERING

Cezanne?

I think so, yeah.

-Cezanne.

-No, that's by Delacroix.

Secondly, the Polish artist who painted this.

The name starts with an L.

THEY CHUCKLE

It's like...Leschenko or something.

-Leschenko?

-It's something like that.

Leschenko.

No, that's Lempicka.

And finally, this British artist.

Well, that's Burne-Jones, isn't it? Burne-Jones?

You don't think it's Rossetti or...

Ooh. Ooh, I don't know.

-I fancy Burne-Jones.

-Go for it.

-Yeah.

Edward Burne-Jones.

That is Burne-Jones. Well done.

APPLAUSE Right, ten points for this.

Answer promptly. Name any three of the five most spoken languages

in the UK after English,

according to the 2011 census.

Polish, Urdu and...

..erm, Hindi.

No.

HOSEGHOOD SIGHS Anyone like to buzz from Newcastle?

Polish, Urdu and Punjabi?

Correct. The other one is Gujarati. APPLAUSE

But not Hindi.

So you get a set of bonuses, Newcastle,

on dependencies in the Caribbean Sea.

The island of Saint Martin, located towards

the north of the Leeward Islands, is divided into two parts

that are territorial possessions of which two European countries?

France and the Netherlands.

-France and the Netherlands.

-Correct.

Secondly, noted for its coral reefs and beaches,

which British Overseas Territory

lies approximately 20km north of Saint Martin?

Its chief town is called The Valley.

Anguilla? Yeah.

-Anguilla.

-Correct.

Saint Croix and Saint Thomas are the two largest islands in which group,

a territorial possession of the United States of America,

located to the south and east of Puerto Rico?

-American Virgin Islands.

-Yeah? American Vi...

-American Virgin Islands.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE Four minutes to go.

Ten points for this. Used for example in the Kyoto Protocol,

the abbreviation GWP stands for what?

It's a measure of how much heat a greenhouse gas

traps in the atmosphere relative to carbon dioxide.

Global warming potential.

Correct.

APPLAUSE

You get three bonuses on the US journalist and scholar HL Mencken.

What is the title of Mencken's magnum opus of 1919,

a study of how the English language was spoken

in the United States?

-Don't know?

-Never heard of the boy.

No. No.

-Let's have it.

-Sorry, we don't know.

That's The American Language.

Mencken was known as the sage of which city on the eastern seaboard?

He worked for that city's Sun newspaper for more than 30 years.

-Er, Baltimore.

-Baltimore.

-Yeah, Baltimore.

-Baltimore?

Correct.

A fictionalised version of Mencken was

portrayed by Gene Kelly in which 1960 film,

a dramatisation of the Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925?

Erm... Yeah!

Something the wind... Something the wind...

Inherit The Wind?

-Maybe, yes. Yes.

-Yeah.

-Inherit The Wind.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE A starter question.

The name of what natural phenomenon links the Chinese term feng shui

with the Japanese term kamikaze?

-Wind.

-Wind is correct.

APPLAUSE

Your bonuses are on words that originated in the Quechua

languages of South America.

In each case, give the word from the definition.

Firstly, a genus of large cats,

including the species also known as the mountain lion or cougar.

You've got caracal, ocelot...

-It's not ocelot because it's not...

-Yeah. Yeah.

-..but...

-What are others?

-Caracal.

-Cougar.

-Cougar?

-That was in the question.

Oh, was it in the question?

We'll go caracal then.

Yeah. Caracal.

No, it's the puma.

An alkaloid obtained from the cinchona bark,

it's used in the treatment of malaria.

-Oh, quinine.

-Yeah, quinine.

Correct. Finally, a natural fertiliser found, for example,

on the Chincha Islands off the coast of Peru.

-Guano.

-Guano?

-Yeah. Yeah.

-Guano.

-Guano is correct. APPLAUSE

Ten points for this. Answer promptly.

Give me the reginal names of any two of the three women who

served as Queen of the Netherlands during the 20th century.

Margaret and Anne.

No, anyone like to buzz from Bristol?

Margarita and Louise.

No, they're Wilhelmina, Juliana and Beatrix.

I think they all abdicated in the end.

So we get another starter question now.

In which New York borough is Conference House Park, which lies

at the southernmost point of both the state and the city of New York?

Bronx.

No, anyone like to buzz from Newcastle?

-Staten Island.

-Correct.

APPLAUSE You get a set of bonuses

on the wives of Roman emperors.

Notorious for her licentious behaviour

and political intrigues, Messalina was the third wife

of which Roman emperor, who ruled from AD 41 to 54?

-Was that Caligula?

-No, no, no, no, Claudius.

-Claudius.

-Claudius.

-Yeah, Claudius.

-Correct. Deified by Claudius, Livia Drusilla

was the wife of which Roman emperor throughout his 40-year reign?

-Augustus.

-Augustus. Augustus.

Correct. Ulpia Severina was the wife of which emperor who reunited

the empire in 274. It's thought she may have ruled in her own right

for six months after his death.

-Is that Diocletian?

-I think so.

Diocletian.

No, it was Aurelian.

Ten points for this.

Which present-day European country is largely

composed of the historical region of Bessarabia

and the separatist enclave of Transnistria?

-Moldova.

-Moldova is right. APPLAUSE

You get a set of bonuses now on world history.

In each case, give the precise year of the 20th century...

GONG

APPLAUSE And at the gong Bristol have 130,

Newcastle have 225.

Well, I don't know about you,

but it felt to me slightly closer than that scoreline suggests.

Thank you both very much for playing.

Bristol, you get another chance to fight again.

You have to win the next two matches you play in these

quarterfinals to stay in the match.

Newcastle, you have to win one more to go through to the semis.

Thank you for joining us, both of you.

I hope you can join us next time for another quarterfinal match,

-but until then, it's goodbye from Bristol University...

-Bye.

-..it's goodbye from Newcastle University...

-Bye.

..and it's goodbye from me. Goodbye.

APPLAUSE