"For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk and we learned to listen..Mankind's greatest acheivements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. "

Stephen Hawking is an English theoretical physicist and mathematics professor at the University of Cambridge. His research in cosmology has led to the unification of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity and Quantum Theory. He became internationally known for his best seller A Brief History of Time.

The first of four children, he was born to Frank and Isobel Hawking in Oxford, England. He has two sisters, Philippa and Mary, and an adopted brother, Edward. The Hawkings temporarily retreated from London, while under German attack, but moved back after the birth of their son. Frank Hawking was a research biologist in the parasitology division of the National Institute for Medical Research.

Upon entering University College, Hawking preferred to study mathematics but chose physics since the former was not offered. After three years, he earned his undergraduate degree in Natural Science with first class honors.

At the age of 21, while studying cosmology at Cambridge, Hawking developed symptoms of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, a motor neuron disease that leads to the loss of all neuromuscular control. Initially given a few years of survival, Hawking has long outlived any other known patient.

Hawking earned his doctorate under the supervision of Denis Sciama. Following, he was a Research Fellow, and later, a Professional Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. He left the Institute of Astronomy in 1973. In 1974 he became the youngest Fellow of the Royal Society. Then he came to the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, where he has held the position of Lucasian Professor of Mathematics since 1979. Lucasion Professor is the mathematical professorship at the University of Cambridge established by former Member of Parliament to the University, Reverend Henry Lucas in 1665. The second professor to hold the chair was Isaac Newton in 1669.

In the 1960's Hawking and his Cambridge colleague, Roger Penrose, expanded on Einstein's General Theory of Relativity to show the implication of space and time beginning with the Big Bang and ending in black holes. This understanding led to the unification of General Relativity with Quantum Theory. He also determined that black holes are not completely black but emit radiation before eventually evaporating and disappearing. His other conjecture is that the universe has no edge and no boundaries in imaginary time.

Hawking's popular publications include, "The Large Scale Structure of Spacetime with GFR Ellis," "General Relativity: An Einstein Centenary Survey and three books, A Brief History of Time (1988), Black Holes and Baby Universes (1993) and The Universe in a Nutshell (2001)

Hawking has been recognized with twelve honorary degrees and is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences.

In January 2007 Hawking announced his plan to travel to space on board a Virgin Galactic spacecraft.

He is almost completely paralyzed. He is able to communicate with a computer system attached to his wheelchair that operates from a infra-red blink switch on his glasses.

Hawking has three children from his first marriage to Jane Wilde in 1965. The couple separated in 1991 and divorced soon after. Hawking then married one of his nurses, Elaine Mason, in 1995. They divorced in 2006.

Jane Hawking published her memoirs of her relationship with Hawking, Music to Move the Stars, in 1999.