World mourns British scientist and cultural icon Hawking
World dignitaries, celebrities and academics on Wednesday mourned Stephen Hawking, the British physicist who died aged 76 after a cosmic career in which his mental genius transcended his physical disability to probe the secrets of the universe. Propelled to stardom by his 1988 book "A Brief History of Time", an unlikely worldwide bestseller, Hawking's genius and wit won over fans from far beyond the rarefied world of astrophysics. As a scientist he earned comparisons with Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton.