Stephen Hawking will visit Israel and the Palestinian Authority on December 15-7

The renowned British scientist, Stephen Hawking, head of the Locks Chair at the University of Cambridge, and author of the bestseller "A Brief History of Time", will visit Israel and the Palestinian Authority between December 5 and 7, 2006

Stephen Hawking. Photo: Philip Waterson (courtesy of the spokeswoman of the British Embassy in Israel)
The British scientist Stephen Hawking will arrive for a three-day visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority, next week, between December 5 and 7, 2006.

The British Embassy opened a website this weekend in English and Hebrew with the details of the visit. The website stated that during his visit, which will take place under the auspices of the British government, Professor Hawking will meet with scientists and academics. He will give lectures to the public at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and meet with young Israeli scientists at the Bloomfield Museum of Science in Jerusalem. Professor Hawking will also visit the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot and Tel Aviv University. In addition, he will meet with representatives of the Israeli National Academy of Sciences and Israeli physicists from the Center for Excellence in Neve Shalom.

In addition, he will lecture at Bir Zeit University in Ramallah, and will talk with Palestinian science students from all over the territories through a video conference organized by the British Council for Culture in East Jerusalem.

The visit of Professor Hawking, who personifies British scientific excellence, will promote Britain as a preferred international partner for scientific and technological collaborations.

In preparation for the visit, Professor Hawking sent the following message from his office in Cambridge: "I am very happy about my planned visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and am excited about the opportunity to meet with Israeli and Palestinian scientists."

Eitan Kerin, Mohammedan adds the biography of Stephen William Hawking, as given to him from Hawking's office in Cambridge:

Stephen Hawking was born on January 8, 1942 (300 years after Galileo's death) in Oxford, England. His parents' home was in North London, but during World War II Oxford was considered a safe place to have children. When he was eight years old, his family moved to St. Albans, a city located 32 km north of London. At the age of 11, Stephen studied at St. Albans School and from there he continued to University College in Oxford where his father studied at the time. Although his father preferred that Stephen study medicine, he wanted to study mathematics. But since University College did not offer mathematics, he chose to study physics instead.

After three years, which did not require much effort from him, he finished his studies in natural sciences with first class honors. Stephen moved to Cambridge to engage in research in cosmology, because at the time no researcher at Oxford was involved in the field. His supervisor was the physicist Dennis Sciema, although he hoped to study under Fred Hoyle, who was working at Cambridge at the time. After receiving his doctorate, he received a research associate position, and then a professorship at Gonnyville and Caius College.

After leaving the Institute of Astronomy in 1973, he moved to the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, and from 1979 he holds the Lucas Chair. The chair was founded in 1663 with the inheritance money left by Reverend Henry Lucas, who was the university's representative in the British Parliament. The first holder of the chair was Isaac Barrow and then, in 1669, it was held by Isaac Newton.

Stephen Hawking is best known thanks to his theory, from 1974, that black holes emit radiation, and the proposal of the absence of limits that he proposed in 1983 together with Jim Hartl of the University of California, Santa Barbara. Among his many publications: "The Large-Scale Structure of Space-Time" which he wrote with JP R. Ellis, "General Relativity: Einstein's Century Survey" with V. Israel and "300 Years of Gravity" with V. Israel. He wrote four popular science books: "A Brief History of Time", "Black Holes, Cub Universes and Other Masses", "The Universe in a Nutshell" and recently "An Even Shorter Brief of the History of Time".

Stephen Hawking has 12 honorary degrees and two British peerages. He won many scientific awards, is a member of the British Royal Society and the American National Academy of Sciences. He combines family life (he has three children and two grandchildren) with research in theoretical physics and an extensive program of world travel and lectures to the general public.
Hawking. Establish a colony on the moon within 20 years and on Mars within 40 years

For the special corner on Hawking's visit to the British Embassy website