Jul 23, 2024 07:51 PM
https://www.quantamagazine.org/vacuum-of...-20240722/
EXCERPTS: Vacuum decay, a process that could end the universe as we know it, may happen 10,000 times sooner than expected. Fortunately, it still won’t happen for a very, very long time.
When physicists speak of “the vacuum,” the term sounds as though it refers to empty space, and in a sense it does. More specifically, it refers to a set of defaults, like settings on a control board. When the quantum fields that permeate space sit at these default values, you consider space to be empty. Small tweaks to the settings create particles — turn the electromagnetic field up a bit, and you get a photon. Big tweaks, on the other hand, are best thought of as new defaults altogether. They create a different definition of empty space, with different traits.
One quantum field is special because its default value can change. Called the Higgs field, it controls the mass of many fundamental particles, like electrons and quarks. Unlike every other quantum field physicists have discovered, the Higgs field has a default value above zero. Dialing the Higgs field value up or down would increase or decrease the mass of electrons and other particles. If the setting of the Higgs field were zero, those particles would be massless.
We could stay at the nonzero default for eternity, were it not for quantum mechanics. A quantum field can “tunnel,” jumping to a new, lower-energy value even if it doesn’t have enough energy to pass through the higher-energy intermediate settings, an effect akin to tunneling through a solid wall.
[...] The Higgs field should eventually tunnel to that state, or “decay.” This decay would start in one place and then spread, a spherical bubble growing at the speed of light, transforming the universe. Fundamental particles would become much heavier, so that they would be drawn together by gravity more strongly than the other forces held them apart. Atoms would collapse.
We won’t tunnel to that higher Higgs setting any time soon, though... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS: Vacuum decay, a process that could end the universe as we know it, may happen 10,000 times sooner than expected. Fortunately, it still won’t happen for a very, very long time.
When physicists speak of “the vacuum,” the term sounds as though it refers to empty space, and in a sense it does. More specifically, it refers to a set of defaults, like settings on a control board. When the quantum fields that permeate space sit at these default values, you consider space to be empty. Small tweaks to the settings create particles — turn the electromagnetic field up a bit, and you get a photon. Big tweaks, on the other hand, are best thought of as new defaults altogether. They create a different definition of empty space, with different traits.
One quantum field is special because its default value can change. Called the Higgs field, it controls the mass of many fundamental particles, like electrons and quarks. Unlike every other quantum field physicists have discovered, the Higgs field has a default value above zero. Dialing the Higgs field value up or down would increase or decrease the mass of electrons and other particles. If the setting of the Higgs field were zero, those particles would be massless.
We could stay at the nonzero default for eternity, were it not for quantum mechanics. A quantum field can “tunnel,” jumping to a new, lower-energy value even if it doesn’t have enough energy to pass through the higher-energy intermediate settings, an effect akin to tunneling through a solid wall.
[...] The Higgs field should eventually tunnel to that state, or “decay.” This decay would start in one place and then spread, a spherical bubble growing at the speed of light, transforming the universe. Fundamental particles would become much heavier, so that they would be drawn together by gravity more strongly than the other forces held them apart. Atoms would collapse.
We won’t tunnel to that higher Higgs setting any time soon, though... (MORE - missing details)