Special Televised Event with Prof. Stephen Hawking to be Seen Across Canada

Dr. Neil Turok, Director of Canada’s Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (PI), will welcome Prof. Stephen Hawking to Waterloo, Ontario, this summer to conduct scientific research and participate in a televised outreach event. 

The world’s most famous living physicist, Prof. Hawking has made several path-breaking contributions to theoretical physics. His visit to Waterloo in June and July of 2010 will mainly focus on scientific research and private collaborations with other leading physicists at PI. Prof. Hawking will also take part in the institute’s award-winning outreach program by delivering a special broadcast on TVO, viewable across Canada.

PI Director Neil Turok, a colleague of Prof. Hawking, said, “We hope Stephen’s visit to Perimeter will be just the first of many. His ideas have had a huge impact on our basic understanding of the universe. He is an exceptional communicator, whether to other scientists or to the wider public. We are delighted he has agreed to deliver a televised lecture, to be shown across Canada. And we are looking forward to his impressions of the ‘Stephen Hawking Centre at Perimeter Institute’ now under construction.”

This past October, when the expansion to the facility was named in his honour, Professor Hawking said, “Our field of theoretical physics has been the most successful and cost-effective in all of science. Where would we be today without Newton, Maxwell and Einstein? Many great challenges lie ahead. Where this new understanding will lead, is impossible to say for sure. What we can say with confidence is that expanding the perimeter of our knowledge will be the key to our future.” 

 Television Event on Sunday, June 20, 2010 at 8 pm EDT

A special PI presentation with Prof. Hawking from Waterloo, Ontario, will be broadcast on TVO on Sunday, June 20, 2010 at 8 pm EDT. “Something TVO does really well is to bring big ideas and bright minds into homes across Canada,” says Lisa de Wilde, TVO’s Chief Executive Officer. “And they don’t come any bigger or brighter than Professor Hawking’s.” Adds de Wilde, “TVO is delighted to once again join forces with Canada’s Perimeter Institute to support scientific literacy. We couldn’t ask for a more powerful follow-up to last year’s collaboration on the Quantum to Cosmos Festival.”

The TVO signal can be found across Canada on Bell TV channel 265 or Shaw Direct channel 353. You will also find TVO on channel 2 via cable or over the air in most areas of Ontario. TVO is Ontario’s public educational media organization and a trusted source of interactive educational content that informs, inspires and stimulates curiosity and thought. TVO’s vision is to empower people to be engaged citizens through educational media. If you would like to receive an email reminder to tune in for the broadcast on June 20, click here.

I Love Science Youth Video Contest Winners Announced

From April 10 to May 10, youth across Canada were given the opportunity to enter the “I Love Science” video contest for a chance to win an all-expenses paid round trip to Perimeter Institute to be part of the “Hawking at the Perimeter” television special. On May 19, Outreach General Manager Greg Dick announced the Grand Prize winners:

• Allison Carter of William Aberhart High School in Calgary, Alberta
• Parastoo Abtahi of Richmond Hill High School in Richmond Hill, Ontario

The PI Outreach team wishes to thank all participants for sharing their passion for science on video. All entries are available for online viewing.

Professor Hawking and Perimeter Institute

Although this will be Prof. Hawking’s first visit to PI, he already has many connections to the institute. Prof. Hawking holds a Distinguished Research Chair at PI, which will see him regularly visit for extended periods to conduct scientific research, starting this June and July. He is also a Patron of the innovative Perimeter Scholars International, a Masters course that nurtures future physics researchers, and will oversee a graduation ceremony for the first class of PSI scholars when he visits. Prof. Hawking was also Honorary President of the recent Quantum to Cosmos: Ideas for the Future Festival, celebrating the 10th anniversary of PI, took part via video in the presentation Perimeter Institute – Past, Present & Future, and appears in PI’s award-winning television documentary, The Quantum Tamers: Revealing our Weird and Wired Future.

About Prof. Hawking

Prof. Stephen Hawking has made several extraordinary contributions to fundamental theoretical physics, especially in establishing the classical and quantum properties of black holes and in building quantum gravitational theories of the origin of the universe and structures within it. His most celebrated work was the theoretical prediction that black holes should emit radiation, known as Hawking radiation. In keeping with university policy, Prof. Hawking retired as the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University in 2009, the year he turned 67. He has authored many popular books, from A Brief History of Time (1988) to George’s Secret Key to the Universe (2007). Additional information regarding Prof. Hawking can be found on PI’s website.