Stephen Hawking's final work will try to answer some of the biggest questions in the universe

Book will collect the late professor's most profound and celebrated writings

Hawking: an extraordinary, paradoxical life (PA)

Stephen Hawking's final work, a book answering some of the deepest questions humanity has ever asked, will be published later this year.

'Brief Answers to the Big Questions' will collect the late professors' answers to the most profound and perplexing questions in the universe.

It will be divided into four questions, publisher John Murray said, which will bring together Professor Hawking's thought: "Why Are We Here? Will We Survive? Will Technology Save Us or Destroy Us? How Can We Thrive?"

The book will cover "everything from the creation of the universe, black holes, alien intelligence, and the existence of God to the importance of space colonisation, and the perils and promise of artificial intelligence", publishers said.

The new book was being discussed at the time of Professor Hawking's death, earlier this year. After he passed away, his estate decided to push ahead with the project – described as "a selection of his most profound, accessible, and timely reflections from his personal archive" – and to give a portion of the proceeds to the Motor Neuron Disease Association and the Stephen Hawking Foundation.

The book will be published in October and further details will be announced in the coming months, publishers said.

In addition to his pioneering discoveries, Stephen Hawking's previous work ranks among the most read and celebrated science writing of all time. His book 'A Brief History of Time' has sold more than 10 million copies in 20 years, and has been published into more than 30 languages.

Professor Hawking's final work was revealed earlier this month. It was a detailed and complex work looking at how the universe began – and arguing that it is finite and more simple than we had presumed.