Conceptual illustration of Hawking radiation being emitted from a black hole. Hawking radiation, named after the physicist Stephen Hawking, is a theoretical radiation that is emitted from outside of a black hole's event horizon. This radiation is thought to occur as the result of twin virtual particles that naturally emerge from the vacuum being separated by gravity. Half of these particles escape as radiation. Hawking radiation is supported by both the models of general relativity and quantum mechanics.