A visionary minded physicist, a scientific promoter, a guru of modern cosmology: Stephen Hawking – who passed away at the age of 76 on March 14, 2018 – has not only been a brilliant scientist, but also a contemporary pop icon, very familiar to the fans of the TV series The Simpsons and to the ones of Star Trek, and during the last period of his life also to the young followers of the boy band One Direction or to the fans of The Big Bang Theory.
In the movie “The Theory of Everything” we have learned the most intimate and dramatic aspects of his exceptional story, but the life of Stephen Hawking is filled with many stories and curiosities, some of which are probably less known to the general public. For instance, did you know about the bet he made forty years ago on black holes? What about his contribution to rock music? Below are 10 facts you should know about the British astrophysicist Stephen Hawking.
Throughout his extraordinary career, the British scientist has gathered an endless number of awards and honors. Besides being a member of the Royal Society (from which he was awarded the prestigious Hughes and Cople medals) and the Royal Society of Arts, in 1986 he was accepted into the very restricted circle of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. Meanwhile, in 2009, Barack Obama gave him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor of the United States of America. A little surprisingly, his trophy cabinet is missing perhaps the most coveted award, the Nobel Prize.
