YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A MASTER CHEF TO MAKE meringue. Simply combine egg whites and sugar in a large bowl and beat vigorously until the mixture is light and fluffy. Spread in a pan and put in an oven preheated to 300 degrees F. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes and voile! Could it be just as easy to make a universe?

Since the big bang theory implies that the entire observed universe can evolve from a tiny speck, it's tempting to ask whether a universe can in principle be created in a laboratory. Given what we know of the laws of physics, would it be possible for an extraordinarily advanced civilization to create new universes at will?

The first thing to think about is the list of necessary ingredients. Curiously, scientific theories continue to offer an enormous range of answers to the question of what the universe was made from. One of the most dramatic differences between the standard big bang theory (without inflation) and the inflationary universe theory is the answer that each gives to this fundamental question.

If the recipe for the standard big bang universe were written in a Cosmic Cookbook, how would it read? To begin the universe at an age of one seco

One might guess that the gravitational repulsion of the false vacuum would push outward on the bubble wall, so if this repulsion were strong enough, the bubble would start to grow. Not so, however, say the equations of general relativity. The gravitational repulsion causes the false vacuum to swell, but the repulsion does not extend beyond the false vacuum. Objects outside the bubble wall are attracted toward the bubble, and the gravitational force on the bubble wall is inward.

The story of inflationary universe creation sounds complete at this point, but there is an important and surprising twist: It is not clear whether it is possible, even in principle, to attain the expansion velocity needed for the false vacuum bubble to evolve into a new universe.

While advanced civilizations can conceivably create multiple universes, inflation itself can have the same effect. Most versions of the inflationary universe theory imply that the false vacuum does not decay all at once, but instead decays a fragment at a time. Each fragment produces a universe, while the bulk of the false vacuum continues eternally to double and redouble in size. Each doubling in size might occur in as little as 10[sup -37] second. Because the time needed for the development of a super-advanced civilization is measured in billions of years or more, there appears to be no chance that laboratory production of universes could compete with the "natural" process of eternal inflation.

The Cosmic Cookbook entry for an inflationary universe, on the other hand, looks as simple as meringue. In this case, the natural starting time would be the onset of inflation -- just a fraction of a second after the Big Bang. In contrast to the standard big bang recipe, the inflationary version calls for only a single ingredient: a region of false vacuum (see "The False Vacuum," page 56). And the region need not be very large. A patch of false vacuum 10-26 centimeter across might be all the recipe demands. While the mass required for the previous recipe was 1032 solar masses, the mass in this case is only an ounce: about the mass of a slice of bread. So, in the inflationary theory the universe evolves from essentially nothing at all, which is why I frequently refer to it as the ultimate free lunch.

On the other hand, a child universe created in a laboratory by a super-advanced civilization would set into motion its own progression of eternal inflation. Could the super-advanced civilization find a way to enhance its efficiency? We may have to wait a few billion years to find out.

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If we assume that the false vacuum driving the inflation has a mass density of about 10[sup 80] grams per cubic centimeter, then the time that it takes the child universe to disconnect is roughly 10[sup -37] second. After this time there will be no contact between the parent universe and child. A false-vacuum-bubble universe creator would watch helplessly as his new universe slipped inexorably through the wormhole and severed all contact. Once the new universe has separated, the black hole that remains in the parent universe would evaporate. It would disappear in roughly 10

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