Objects in Our Universe Evaporate Faster than Thought, Scientists Say

In a 2023 paper, Professor Heino Falcke and his colleagues at Radboud University showed that not only black holes, but also all other objects in the Universe can ‘evaporate’ via a process akin to Hawking radiation. After that publication, the authors received many questions about how long the process would take. In a new study, they calculated that the end of the Universe is about 10⁷⁸ years away, if only Hawking-like radiation is taken into account. This is the time it takes for white dwarfs — the most persistent celestial bodies — to decay via Hawking-like radiation. Previous studies, which did not take this effect into account, put the lifetime of white dwarfs at 10¹¹⁰⁰ years.