NEW DELHI: Stephen Hawking, a renowned mathematician, physicist and pop culture icon, has passed away at the age of 76 on Wednesday. Image: hawking.org
Professor Stephen William Hawking was born on 8th January 1942 (exactly 300 years after the death of Galileo) in Oxford, England. Image: hawking.org
In 1963, Hawking contracted motor neurone disease and was given two years to live. Yet he went on to Cambridge to become a brilliant researcher and Professorial Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. Image: hawking.org
When Hawking was a graduate student at Cambridge, his relationship with Jane Wilde, a friend of his sister whom he had met shortly before his diagnosis with motor neurone disease, continued to develop. Image: hawking.org
The couple became engaged in October 1964– Hawking later said that the engagement gave him "something to live for" – and the two were married on 14 July 1965. Image: AFP
Professor Stephen Hawking has worked on the basic laws which govern the universe. Image: AP
Among the popular books Stephen Hawking has published are his best seller A Brief History of Time, Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays, The Universe in a Nutshell, The Grand Design and My Brief History. Image: hawking.org
Stephen Hawking was regarded as one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Einstein. Image: AFP