A woman from Canada has become the first person ever to graduate with a Master's degree in The Beatles.

The Masters course, entitled 'The Beatles - Popular Music and Society', was set up at Liverpool Hope University in 2009.

The course requires students to learn how the fab four helped to define identities, culture and society.

"Its absolutely academic. It was an examination of how The Beatles came to be. What the political and social climate was and the cultural aspects that helped to facilitate an environment where The Beatles' could happen," Graduate Mary-Lu Zahalan-Kennedy told The BBC.

She added: "It was a lot of history. It was very much having to understand all of the history of British music, British politics and the economic state of the country at the time and what people where doing to stay positive and how music impacted on everyday life."

(by Holly Frith)