Super-brain cosmologist born on 300th death anniversary of Galileo Galilei and passed away on 30th anniversary of pie day: Stephen Hawking

Stephen was the most renowned scientist whose brilliant contributions to Cosmology paved way for many interesting discoveries, regarding the universe. His Grand Unified Theory and singularity concept were widely acclaimed. He was given more than a dozen honorary degrees and was awarded the CBE in 1982.

His contribution to Grand Unified Theory:

Stephen Hawking worked on black holes which he stated as incredibly dense with infinite gravity where not even light can escape and everything gets absorbed. Hawking had worked with another scientist to find that the center of the black hole holds the Singularity, where everything crushes to becomes a single dot.

The vacuum contains numerous small particles popping up which tend to exist but eventually slip into black holes to get extinct. Such tiny stream of scraping particles is called Hawking’s radiation. The particles that fall into the black hole have negative mass and gets shrunk into a small dot for so long and in its final level, the black hole explodes with a great energy equal to millions of nuclear bombs, leaving nothing behind. This was how the whole universe was formed.

He once said, “It would not be much of a universe if it wasn’t home to the people you love”. Stephen had his book “A Brief History of Time” edited by Peter Guzzardi, which explains the “Grand Unified Theory of Everything” which was translated into more than 35 languages and was sold more than 10 million copies worldwide, is an instant best-seller.

Life of Stephen:

Stephen William Hawking was born in Oxford on Jan 8th, 1942, the eldest of the four children. He studied Natural sciences at University college of Oxford where he was offered a scholarship. In 1962, he began his graduate research in Cosmology at Cambridge University. It was in 1963 he was diagnosed with degenerative nerve disorder ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and was said that he got just two years of life for him. But he married Jane Wilde after two years and the couple was blessed with three children Robert, Lucy, and Tim.

Stephen Hawking was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society at the age of 32, in 1974 being one of the youngest people to receive such honor. During 1979-2009 Stephan served as a Lucasian professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, the post once served by Issac Newton. After six years of joining this post, in 1985, Stephan was admitted to hospital with Pneumonia where he survived an operation but lost his speech. By the next year, he started communicating through his electronic voice synthesizer which became his robotic voice. Thanks to technology!!

Early diagnosis of his terminal disease and witnessing the death from Leukemia of a boy he knew in hospital, brought an insight of life and he understood its pattern. Referring this, he once said, “Although there is a cloud hanging over my future, I found, to my surprise, that I was enjoying life in the present form more than before”.

Stephan Hawking never gave up though doctors said that his life will be terminated in two years. He went on to study cosmology at Cambridge and became one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Albert Einstein. He was most loved by his fellow beings for his sense of humor. His words inspired many.

Stephen Hawking once spoke of death saying, “I have lived with the prospect of an early death for the last 49 years. I’m not afraid of death, but I’m in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first” the legend said.