Stephen Hawking to Leave Britain over Government Cuts in Science

Professor Stephen Hawking is planning to abandon Cambridge University after nearly 50 years and move to Canada in protest at Government cuts. The world's most famous physicist has become frustrated with falling university budgets, which he believes are scuppering scientific discoveries.

The departure of Professor Hawking, who began work in Cambridge in 1962, would be a massive blow to the university and to British scholarship. The 68-year-old - who has made key advances in theoretical physics while almost completely paralysed by motor neurone disease - said restrictions in grants mean scientific research in Britain is increasingly focused on its industrial application rather than the pursuit of knowledge and discovery.

The best-selling author of A Brief History Of Time is to spend two months at the Perimeter Institute, in Ontario, this summer and, if all goes to plan, hopes to make the move permanent. Yesterday his spokesman said Professor Hawking 'remained heavily critical of the Government's policy on science funding', saying it risked ending Britain's history of world-class thinkers.

In an attempt to reduce the Government's deficit, cuts to higher education amounting to roughly £1billion over three years have been announced. His graduate assistant Sam Blackburn said: 'Professor Hawking is considering a move but it would depend on whether his trip to the institute is successful.'

However, a move abroad would present Professor Hawking with difficulties as his disability means he requires an entourage including carers and a graduate assistant to operate his voice synthesiser.

And he would leave behind his adapted home and members of his family from his first marriage to Jane Hawking, with whom he was reconciled in 2007 after a divorce from second wife Elaine Mason. Professor Hawking would follow his former colleague Neil Turok, an authority on mathematical physics, who left for the institute in 2008.

Professor Turok has said the 'door is open' for Professor Hawking to join him permanently and has stated that the physicist's summer visit 'is the first of many'.

In contrast to Cambridge, the Perimeter Institute - set up seven years ago by Mike Lazaridis, the creator of the BlackBerry handheld device - has raised substantial funding from private donations.

It is ironic that Professor Hawking would leave Cambridge, which has arguably done more to advance the understanding of science than any university in the world. It is where Charles Darwin formulated the theory of evolution and Francis Crick and James Watson identified the structure of DNA.

Professor Hawking's distant predecessor as its Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, Sir Isaac Newton, founded modern science with his laws of motion and gravity.

A spokesman for Cambridge University, said: 'Professor Hawking has no plans to leave Cambridge at present. However, he will be a regular visitor to the Perimeter Institute for research purposes.'

This 'Rubber Man' Tries to Set The Guinness Book of World Records

Vijay Sharma can wrap his legs over his head, wriggle through a tennis racket and wind his arms around his back. His flexibility has earned him the title of 'Rubber Man' in the Limca book of Records, India's version of the Guinness book of World Records, and he hopes to one-day achieve global fame.

'It was when I was training for martial arts I realised my body was so bendable I might be capable of setting a world record in flexibility,' the 27-year-old said. The shop assistant Vijay claims his bendy obsession stems from watching Jackie Chan movies when he was a youngster.

The village boy from Rajashtan's Jhunjhunu district started taking martial arts lessons in 1999 in a bid to learn Chan's acrobatic fighting style. It was during these lessons he discovered the extent of his flexibility and started experimenting.

He squeezed into tiny spaces, curled his body into boxes and attempted to drink from bottles held between his toes. After seeing the tennis racket stunt in Guinness book of world records, he became curious and bought a tennis racket the next day.  He quickly removed the strings and tried to pass through the nine-and-a-half-inch surface.

'I tried to get through it, but got stuck for the entire night,' he said.  'I had to shut myself in my room and sleep with it. I got up at 3 o clock and tried to get out of it.

'I began to bleed but that didn't stop me.' Vijay, who practices up to four hours a day to improve his elasticity, has performed on TV Shows and various tournaments at national level. But he believes, he has performed the toughest stunt on a Zee TV show.

'I added a kick to my stunt, that is I pulled my leg up all the way so it was perpendicular to the floor and pushed my torso along with my leg out of the racket,' he explained.

'It was such a stunt that I couldn't breathe for a moment while doing it.' He has won a silver medal in body flexibility at a country level tournament, held at Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh in 2001. He also claims to have broken the world record for wrist-egg-crushing - which involves pushing your hand backwards to lie flat against the arm - set by a Lissa Patterson (CORR) in 2005.

'I made the claim and even got some documents from Guinness Book of World Records to complete, but I couldn't get back because of constraints of time and money,' he said.

Least interested in his father's clothes shop business, Vijay wants to achieve fame by working on martial arts and body flexibility. 'Anything for fame,' he said.