Stephen Hawking

Professor Stephen William Hawking was born on January 8, 1942 in Oxford, England. He was known for his groundbreaking work with black holes and relativity. Moreover, he was the author of several popular science books, including A Brief History of Time and Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays.WATCH: When Albert Einstein, Issac Newton and Stephen Hawking played pokerHawking had thirteen honorary degrees. He was also a Fellow of the Royal Society and a member of the US National Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.In 1963, Hawking was diagnosed with ALS, a form of Motor Neurone Disease, pretty much after his 21st birthday. Though he was wheelchair-bound and dependent on a computerized voice system for communication, Hawking continued with his family life (he has three children and three grandchildren) with his research into theoretical physics.A timeline of Stephen Hawking's life On March 14, 2018, Stephen Hawking died at the age of 76 at his home in Cambridge

The renowned physicist and professor at the University of Cambridge made many discoveries in physics, mathematics and cosmology.

Hawking suffered for decades from ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

His early encounter with the disease during was depicted in the film "The Theory of Everything" in 2014.

Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has died at the age of 76.

Hawking, who was a professor at the University of Cambridge, made several discoveries in the field of physics, mathematics and cosmology that raised his profile internationally.

 

His better-known works involve black holes and the theory of relativity. He also wrote a number of popular science books, including "A Brief History of Time."

Hawking suffered for most of his life from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease. The condition causes nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord to degenerate.

ALS typically kills sufferers within the first few years, but Hawking survived the disease for decades. His early encounter with the disease during his younger years was depicted in the film "The Theory of Everything" in 2014.

In recent months, Hawking warned vocally about the dangers posed by artificial intelligence. Last year, he said A.I. could be the "worst event in the history of our civilization."

A glance at the life of Stephen Hawking

Jan 8, 1942- Born in Oxford, England, the eldest of four children born to Frank Hawking, a biologist, and Isobel Hawking, a medical research secretary.

1952- Attends St. Albans School.

1959- Receives scholarship to attend University College, Oxford, from which he graduates with a degree in Natural Science.

1962- Begins graduate research in cosmology at Cambridge University.

1963- Diagnosed with the degenerative nerve disorder ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease, at the age of 21. He is given two years to live.

July 14, 1965- Marries his first wife, Jane Wilde, a modern languages student he met at Cambridge.

1967- The couple's first son, Robert, is born.

1970- Jane gives birth to a daughter, Lucy.

1974- Elected as a fellow of the Royal Society at age 32, one of the youngest people to receive the honor.

1979- Becomes Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, a prestigious position once held by Isaac Newton. Hawking holds the post until 2009. Jane gives birth to a third child, Timothy.

1985- Admitted to a hospital in Geneva with pneumonia. He survives after an operation, but loses what remained of his speech. The next year he begins communicating through the electronic voice synthesizer that gave him his trademark robotic ``voice.''

1988- Publishes "A Brief History of Time," a book on cosmology aimed at the general public that becomes an instant best-seller.

989- Made a Companion of Honor by Queen Elizabeth II.

1995- Marries his nurse, Elaine Mason.

2007- Divorces Elaine Mason.

2014- Hawking's life is celebrated in the Oscar-winning biopic "The Theory of Everything," based on the memoir "Travelling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen," by Jane Hawking.

The universe started as a singularity

It's only fitting that Professor Hawking's first big discovery addressed the very first moments of the universe.

The big bang theory — that the universe expanded from a minuscule dot that expanded (and is still expanding) — is widely accepted today.

But in the 1960s that wasn't the case.

As a young researcher at Cambridge, Professor Hawking started thinking about the problem in terms of Einstein's theory of general relativity.

With mathematician Roger Penrose, Professor Hawking published a paper in 1970 showing that the big bang theory must hold true.

Black holes aren't completely black

Most of Professor Hawking's work, though, applies to black holes: a patch of space where gravity is so intense that nothing — not even light — can escape.

A black hole's event horizon is the boundary where a particle would have to travel faster than the speed of light to escape.

But what if black holes emitted a bit of radiation?

Enter quantum theory. Empty space isn't empty: pairs of particles, one matter and one anti-matter, continually spontaneously pop into existence.

They quickly destroy each other, so fast they can't be detected.

Professor Hawking thought that if these particle pairs popped up next to a black hole, one particle might fall inside the black hole's event horizon.

The other would dribble off into space. This tiny amount of energy is called Hawking radiation.

And if the anti-matter particle was sucked in by the black hole, the total energy of the black hole would drop ever so slightly and so would its mass.

Then, over vast aeons — far longer than the age of the universe — black holes would end their life in an explosion.

In his 1974 paper on the topic, Professor Hawking wrote: "This is a fairly small explosion by astronomical standards, but it is equivalent to about 1 million 1 megaton hydrogen bombs."