Stephen Hawking - In March 1959 Hawking took the scholarship examinations with the aim of studying natural sciences at Oxford. He was awarded a scholarship, despite feeling that he had performed badly, and at University College he specialized in physics in his natural sciences degree. From Oxford, Hawking moved to Cambridge to take up research in general relativity and cosmology. After completing his doctorate in 1966 Hawking was awarded a fellowship at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. He became Professor of Gravitational Physics at Cambridge in 1977. In 1979 Hawking was appointed Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge. The man born 300 years to the day after Galileo died now held Newton's chair at Cambridge. Continuing this work on black holes, Hawking discovered in 1970 a remarkable property. Using quantum theory and general relativity he was able to show that black holes can emit radiation. His success with proving this made him work from that time on combining the theory of general relativity with quantum theory. In 1971 Hawking investigated the creation of the Universe and predicted that, following the big bang, many objects as heavy as 109 tons but only the size of a proton would be created. These mini black holes have large gravitational attraction governed by general relativity, while the laws of quantum mechanics would apply to objects that small.