World loses its brightest star

British scientist Stephen Hawking, aged 76, dies

Stephen Hawking, the legendary British theoretical physicist who explored mysteries of the universe from his wheelchair and went on to become an inspiring figure globally, died at his home in Cambridge. His family said that Hawking, 76, died peacefully in his home near Cambridge University, where he did much of his groundbreaking work on black holes and relativity.

"We are deeply saddened that our beloved father passed away today," Hawking's children, Lucy, Robert and Tim said in a statement. "

Hawking was born in Oxford, England, on January 8 – the 300th anniversary of the death of astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei. Hawking suffered from ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), a neurodegenerative disease commonly known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, which is usually fatal within a few years. He was diagnosed in 1963, when he was 21, and doctors initially only gave him a few years to live. But he went on to study at Cambridge and became one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists since Albert Einstein.

The disease left Hawking

“I want to show that people need not be limited by physical handicaps as long as they are not disabled in spirit.”

wheelchair-bound and paralysed. He was able to move only a few fingers on one hand and was completely dependent on others or on technology for virtually everything -- bathing, dressing, eating, even speech.

Known for his unique way of speaking while living his life in a wheelchair, Hawking became an emblem of human determination and curiosity. Hawking's first major breakthrough came in 1970, when he and Roger Penrose applied the mathematics of black holes to the entire universe and showed that a singularity, a region of infinite curvature in space-time, lay in our distant past: the point from which came the big bang.

His seminal contributions continued through the 1980s. But it was 'A Brief History of Time' that rocketed Hawking to stardom.

Published for the first time in 1988, the title made the 'Guinness Book of Records' after it stayed on 'The Sunday Times' bestsellers list for an unprecedented 237 weeks.