Professor Stephen Hawking submitted a final research paper just two weeks before he died that predicts the end of the world and humanity's existence.

The new paper, named A Smooth Exit from Eternal Inflation, has been described as "groundbreaking" and is currently under review by a journal, as reported by The Mirror.

Scientists are already suggesting that it could be a breakthrough in the cosmology field.

The document, thought to be completed on Prof Hawking's deathbed, describes how our universe will eventually fade into blackness as all its stars run out of energy.

Christians could also refer to this as Rapture - which is an end time event set out in the Bible.

It also reveals how we might detect evidence of a multiverse, laying out the maths that might be needed for a space probe to uncover such evidence.

Hawking was never nominated for a Nobel prize during his lifetime, but many experts (including Professor Thomas Hertog, the co-author of the new paper) believe he would have been in the running if he'd managed to prove the existence of a multiverse while still alive.

Prof Hawking, a dad of three, had believed there was more than one universe.

His “no boundary" theory, which he developed with James Hartle, described how the universe does not have a boundary and came into existence through the Big Bang.

However, the theory also suggested that other 'Big Bangs' took place - producing an infinite number of universes, which can be referred to as a "multiverse".

“We wanted to transform the idea of a multiverse into a testable scientific framework,” said Prof Hertog.

Prof Hawking, who died at his Cambridge home, was given just a few years to live when he was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in his early twenties.

But defying medics' expectations, he lived to 76. During his lifetime, he married twice - to Jane Wilde and Elaine Mason - and had three kids, Lucy, Robert and Tim.