Scientists achieve the impossible by creating matter from empty space

Scientists achieve the impossible by creating matter from empty space

Something has been lurking in empty space, and for the first time, physicists may have caught it leaving fingerprints. Quantum theory has long predicted that the vacuum seethes with virtual particles, pairs that flicker in and out of existence too briefly to observe directly. But a new experiment at Brookhaven National Laboratory suggests those fleeting pairs are not entirely invisible. Under the right conditions, they can be jolted into reality…