Stephen Hawking (England) (1942 - )
Stephen Hawking is attempting to extend Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, working on gravity and particularly on the nature of black holes. He contracted the muscle-wasting motor neurone disease in the 1960s, which has left him in a wheelchair and unable to talk. Despite this he has continued, by using a computer to communicate, to try to find out more about the origins of the universe, and to share this new information with the general public as well as to high-level scientists.