JAKARTA – Stephen Hawking is a famous theoretical physicist and cosmologist. Scientist Born January 8, 1942 in England, he contributed greatly to the fields of cosmology, gravity, quantum theory related to black hole thermodynamics, and information theory.
His famous book “A Brief History of Time” is a bestseller. He has received several awards such as the Gold Medal from the RAS, the Copley Medal from the Royal Society and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Here are 3 important discoveries of Stephen Hawking, summarized by SINDOnews from the Jagranjosh page, Monday (13/6/2022).
1. The Singularity (1970)
Albert Einstein’s theory of gravity also talks about singularities, which are points at which space-time appears to be infinitely curved. However, at the time, it was unclear whether the singularity was real or not. Later, Roger Penrose proved that singularities would indeed form in black holes.
Later, Stephen Hawking did groundbreaking work on singularities and applied them to the entire Universe and said that gravity produces singularities. He also relates that Einstein’s theory predicts the singularity which is the big bang theory.
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2. The laws of black hole mechanics (1971-72)
Stephen Hawking discovered the laws of black hole mechanics. His first law states that the total surface area of a black hole will never decrease. This is also known as Hawking’s area theorem.
Another law states that black holes are hot. But it is a contradiction of classical physics which states that black holes do not emit heat. Another law is the “no hair” black hole theorem, which states that a black hole can be characterized by three numbers; mass, angular momentum, and charge.
Black holes emit radiation, which may continue until the energy is exhausted and evaporates. This is also known as Hawking radiation. In January 1971, he won the prestigious Gravity Research foundation Award for his essay “Black Hole”.
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3. The Cosmic Inflation Theory (1982)
This theory was introduced by Alan Guth in 1980 that in physical cosmology, cosmic inflation is the theory in which the Universe expands exponentially immediately after the big bang. Furthermore, Hawking was one of the first to quantify quantum fluctuations which mean small variations in the distribution of matter and showed that during inflation it might give rise to the spread of galaxies in the universe.
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