Corpus Clock

The Corpus Clock is a large sculptural clock. Its a £1m clock called as "time eater" which was unveiled by Professor Stephen Hawking at Cambridge University.

As the News has reported, the mechanical clock has been designed and paid for by Dr John Taylor, an honorary fellow at the college, and it has pride of place on the college's new library, which is also funded by him. The timepiece was a tribute to English clockmaker John Harrison who solved the problem of longitude in the 18th century.

The clock is powered by a pendulum, driven by a mechanism in the shape of a giant grasshopper.

The grasshopper or "chronophage", meaning "time eater", advances around the 4ft-wide face, each step marking a second. Its movement triggers blue flashing lights which travel across the face eventually stopping at the correct hour and minute. But the clock is only accurate once every five minutes - the rest of the time the lights are simply for decoration.

Dr Taylor told the News: "It is my way of giving something back to my old college and to Cambridge - and I expect the clock will last for 200 years."