Stephen Hawking's PhD thesis has caused the University of Cambridge's website to crash after being made freely available to the general public for the first time.

Professor Hawking's 1966 thesis "Properties of expanding universes" was made openly accessible on the publications section of university's website just after midnight on Monday.

Tens of thousands of people had accessed the academic's work in the first twelve hours after the university put the paper online.

But such was the demand to read the 134-page document, written by the physicist as a 24-year-old postgraduate, that the website intermittently crashed.

Cambridge University said more than 60,000 people have gone onto their website to read or download the work so far.

Other theses are "fairly well used comparatively", the University said, "but most would have fewer than 100 views a month".

Regarded as one of the most brilliant physicists since Einstein, Prof Hawking humbly said he hoped people would not be "disappointed" after finally having access to his thesis.

Professor Stephen Hawking added that he hoped to "inspire people" by making his university work available and encouraged other academics to do the same.

"Anyone, anywhere in the world should have free, unhindered access to not just my research, but to the research of every great and enquiring mind across the spectrum of human understanding," he said.