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Physicist and sci-fi icon Stephen Hawking will not be leaving his University of Cambridge position to embark on a new career in Waterloo, Ont., but Canadian experts say it's no surprise a world-renowned scientist might consider calling the region home.
“The local geography might be further down the list than other criteria like who else might he be working with, who are the other minds he'll be able to tap into,” said technology expert Tom Vassos, a professor at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management.
But Mr. Vassos said while Waterloo may not hold the glamour of New York City, the southern Ontario city is known worldwide as a centre of technology and innovation.
On Wednesday, Britain's Daily Telegraph reported the 66-year-old scientist was mulling over a decision to move to Canada to work at the Perimeter Institute, a research centre devoted to theoretical physics that was founded in 1999 by Research In Motion co-CEO Mike Lazaridis.
Professor Stephen Hawking of the University of Cambridge in April at George Washington University in Washington. (Lawrence Jackson/Associated Press)
It was rumoured Mr. Hawking would follow his good friend and Cambridge University colleague Neil Turok, who will be heading up the Perimeter Institute in the fall.
Mr. Hawking and other scientists in the United Kingdom recently expressed outrage over the British government's decision to cut millions of dollars in scientific funding. Mr. Hawking has called the $160-million in cuts disastrous, saying it would “cause enormous damage both to British science” and Britain's “international reputation.”
Mr. Turok decided to leave Cambridge after similar complaints about lack of funding.
The university refused to spend $40-million on expanding the Centre for Theoretical Cosmology and would not convert the centre into the Hawking Institute.
Mr. Turok told the Daily Telegraph he is keeping the “door open” for Mr. Hawking to join him at the Perimeter Institute.
Those comments fuelled international buzz that Mr. Hawking, the award-winning author of A Brief History of Time who has been immortalized in cartoons and television cameos, would bring his talents to Waterloo.
But the rumours surrounding Mr. Hawking's possible move were quickly dismissed by his aides.
“It has been a little exaggerated,” said Mr. Hawking's graduate assistant Sam Blackburn, adding that while Mr. Hawking intends to visit Mr. Turok in Waterloo, he would likely only stay a week.
Mr. Hawking's personal assistant Judith Croasdell said Mr. Turok's complaints about funding may be justified, but there are no immediate plans for Mr. Hawking to leave Cambridge.
“I think he thought he was going to be part of the brain drain, and this isn't actually correct – he's not,” Ms. Croasdell said.
But the door hasn't been closed entirely on Mr. Hawking moving to Waterloo, said Perimeter Institute spokesman John Matlock.
The opportunity for Mr. Hawking to work in the region is not out of the question since hundreds of scientists from around the world descend on the Perimeter Institute each year, staying weeks or months to collaborate on research, said Mr. Matlock, who referred to Mr. Hawking as a “sci-lebrity.”
“It just happens to be in the populist culture that Stephen Hawking is well known, but we already have top pre-eminent physicists who visit here regularly – they're just not in the public consciousness,” Mr. Matlock said. “They haven't done Star Trek or The Simpsons.”
