There are few scientists in the modern world who have got celebrity recognition and admirers. One of them is physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking. His death on March 14, 2018 came as a shock to the entire scientific community as well as non-scientists who admired him. Despite fighting a battle with ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis), his desire to explore the universe spread his scientific knowledge to the rest of the world. From the creation of the universe to its possible end, Hawking made calculative predictions about it.
Remembering him on his death anniversary, here are some important discoveries that can be attributed to a phenomenal scientist and inspiring man.
proving a black hole
Stephen Hawking was the first to provide mathematical proof for the existence of black holes. They were a theory before Hawking’s recognition.
Hawking radiation
His prediction that black holes emit radiation proved to be true and was named after him. Thanks to these predictions, we now know that black holes can vary in size according to the energy they radiate.
Hawking field theorem
It was a collaboration with Brandon Carter and James Bardeen. Together, they discovered the laws of the mechanics of black holes. The first of these was named after Hawking, who states that black holes are never small in terms of total surface area.
black hole formation
Apart from discovering the existence of black holes, Hawking also explained how they were formed. As a star dies, its entire mass collapses into a point (or singularity) of infinite density which in turn forms a black hole.
theory of time
His theories about time are quite interesting. One of the many time-related theories he proposed was that before the Big Bang explosion (widely accepted as the event leading to the birth of our present-day universe) time was basically non-existent. This means that questions about “what existed or what happened before” this event are essentially meaningless.