Stephen Hawking and Black Holes

• Stephen Hawking was a theoretical physicist who used mathematics to explore black holes and the origin of the Universe.
• He popularized science, enhancing the understanding of space-time, gravity, and humanity's place in the cosmos.
• Hawking was diagnosed with ALS in 1963 while studying astronomy at Cambridge University.
• ALS confined him to a wheelchair from 1969 and took away his voice in 1985.
• He communicated using a computer linked to a speech synthesizer controlled by his facial muscles.

Black Holes

• The term "black hole" was coined in 1967, although Karl Schwarzschild had hypothesized their existence in the 1910s.
• Matter pulled into a black hole creates X-rays.
• Astronomers detected "X-ray binaries" near star-forming regions in the Milky Way in 1964, suggesting a possible black hole.

Hawking's Theories

• Hawking studied the work of mathematician Roger Penrose.
• Penrose proved that the collapse of a giant star results in a singularity, which is an infinitely dense and small point in space-time if Einstein's theory of relativity is correct.
• Hawking suggested in his PhD thesis that the Universe could have started from a singularity, running the process in reverse.
• He compared the beginning of the Universe to the South Pole.

Hawking Radiation

• Hawking refined his black hole theories after a debate with Jacob Bekenstein in 1972, considering quantum mechanics.
• Quantum mechanics states that pairs of particles and antiparticles are constantly meeting and annihilating each other throughout the Universe.
• Hawking calculated that near the event horizon of a black hole, a negatively charged particle falls into the black hole.
• The positively charged half of the pair streams away as radiation, known as Hawking radiation.
• Hawking stated that black holes lose energy and mass through black hole evaporation.
• This is where negatively charged particles fall into it, eventually disappearing in a final explosion.
• In 1974, Hawking published his calculation showing how both the Universe began and how black holes evaporate.
• By combining general relativity and quantum mechanics, he created a vital clue in the search for a "theory of everything".

Recognition

• In 1979, Hawking became Cambridge’s Lucasian Professor of Mathematics.
• He wrote popular science books, including A Brief History of Time, which made him widely known.
• Hawking gave public lectures about his work.

Roger Penrose

• Roger Penrose is a British mathematician and theoretical physicist known for his work on black holes and the Big Bang theory.
• Penrose collaborated with Stephen Hawking to prove that black holes can arise from the gravitational collapse of massive stars.
• Penrose also developed twistor theory and a way of mapping the regions of space-time around a black hole using Penrose diagrams.

Explore Stephen Hawking's theories on black holes and the universe. Diagnosed with ALS, he communicated through a speech synthesizer. His work enhanced the understanding of space-time and gravity.