The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine.
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