Prof Hawking space riddle

Professor Stephen Hawking and Russian billionaire Yuri Milner will hold a press conference in New York City on Tuesday announcing the rather mysterious Starshot initiative.

No details have been released as yet about the space exploration program, but the press conference will begin at 1600 UTC (0900 PST) and will be streamed live. Given The Hawk doesn't do these kinds of press conferences often, it should be something fairly big.

There are a couple of hints, however. April 12 is the 55th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin becoming the first man in space. Secondly, Milner has poured money into space and science research – he has plowed $100m into the SETI Project and is funding life extension technology. ®