Professor Stephen Hawking, who has devoted his career to finding the origins of the universe, is to begin a new search -- for Africa's answer to Einstein.

Despite suffering from motor neurone disease which has left him almost completely paralysed, Hawking, 66, has made the journey to South Africa to launch the project today.

Some of the world's leading high-tech entrepreneurs and scientists have backed the £75m plan to create Africa's first postgraduate centres for advanced maths and physics, after the British government declined to provide funding.

Hawking will be joined by eminent physicists and mathematicians including two Nobel laureates in physics, David Gross and George Smoot, and Michael Griffin, the head of Nasa. Naledi Pandor, South Africa's education minister, will also speak.

"The world of science needs Africa's brilliant talents and I look forward to meeting prospective young Einsteins from Africa,"said Hawking.

Neil Turok, founder of the project and professor of mathematical physics at Cambridge University, where he is a close colleague of Hawking, said the aim of the centres was to "unlock and nurture scientific talent"across Africa. "Apart from an African Einstein, we want to find the African Bill Gates and the Sergey Brins and Larry Pages of the future,"said Turok, referring to the founders of Microsoft and Google.