Stephen Hawking and Yuri Milner are set to announce a space exploration initiative called Starshot. Hawking and Milner, the founder of DST Global and Breakthrough Prize, will reveal details of the initiative at a press conference at the One World Observatory in New York.

A livestream of the event Breakthrough Starshot can be viewed below or by clicking here. The event will begin at 12pm ET (5pm BST).

Last year, Hawking and Milner announced the $100m (£88m) global Breakthrough Initiatives, which aims to speed up the search for life in the universe. The first of the initiatives, Breakthrough Listen, was dubbed as the "most powerful, comprehensive and intensive scientific search ever undertaken for signs of intelligent life beyond Earth".

The second, Breakthrough Message, was to fund a competition to create messages to represent humanity, which could one day be sent to any potential intelligent lifeforms beyond our planet.

Commenting on the launch of Breakthrough Listen and Message were launched, Hawking said: