Stephen Hawking auction: Wheelchair and Simpsons script up for grabs

Stephen Hawking’s wheelchair and a script for a Simpsons episode he starred in are up for grabs.

An online auction, to be held by Christie’s London next week, is expected to raise hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The sale will feature 22 items belonging to Professor Hawking, the much-loved physicist who died in March this year.

It includes one of five existing copies of Professor Hawking's 1965 Cambridge University PhD thesis, "Properties of Expanding Universes". This carries an estimated price of up to £150,000.

Another paper up for sale is the seminal “Black Hole Explosions” of 1974.

There will also be medals, a copy of his best-selling “A Brief History of Time” signed with a thumbprint, a bomber jacket and the Simpsons script.

The last item to go on sale, one of Mr Hawking’s wheelchairs, will be sold to benefit the Stephen Hawking Foundation and the Motor Neurone Disease Association.

Thomas Venning, head of the books and manuscripts department at Christie’s, said: “The lots selected for sale highlight Professor Hawking’s remarkable achievements in science alongside his unique personality and inspirational life story.”

Mr Hawking’s daughter, Lucy, said: “We are giving admirers of his work the chance to acquire a memento of our father’s extraordinary life in the shape of a small selection of evocative and fascinating items.”

The auction will run from October 31 to November 8.