The quantum vacuum underlies the level of quanta and is a virtual-energy filled substrate rather than empty space) is the cosmic matrix in which the particles and systems that constitute the materials of the world arise. The quantum vacuum is an integration of what we used to think of as energy and information. It is a field of informed energy.

The particles that appear as the material of the universe are entangled excitations of the ground state of this cosmic matrix. The systems that appear as objects composed of material particles are locally manifest yet intrinsically entangled configurations of excitations in that matrix. The particles and systems we observe emerged in the course of evolution in the cosmos. Following the Big Bang (which appears to have been a Big Bounce, a phase-change in the sequence of local universes in the multiverse) the first entities to emerge were photons, protons, neutrons and electrons, and other, more short-lived exchange particles. In processes of galactic and stellar evolution the higher-order configurations we know as the atoms of the elements had emerged.

The current material of spacetime are superordinate configurations of the excitations of the cosmic matrix. Galaxies are composed of stars and stellar systems, and stars are composed of atoms and particles. All these systems are composed of particles, and particles are entangled excitations of the matrix. Atoms, molecules, cells, organisms—and on the macroscale planets, stars, stellar systems and galaxies—are in the final count superordinate quantum systems: various-level configurations of informed energy.

On suitable planetary surfaces higher-order configurations of informed energy made their appearance. We call the self-maintaining and self-reproducing variety of these configurations living organisms. Life is not accidental or extraneous phenomena in the universe: the latest observations in astrophysics show that the basic building elements of life, including glycine (which is an amino acid), and ethylene gycol (a compound associated with the formation of sugars in organisms) are synthesized in the course of the physico- chemical evolution of stars. The surface of planets associated with active stars are templates for the further complexification of these elements, building sequentially higher order configurations of informed-energy.

Information is a paramount factor in the emergence and persistence of informed-energy configurations. In the absence of information the energies present in the universe would be a random concourse of excitations of its ground state. Information structures the energy-sea of the cosmic matrix, and coordinates interaction among the structures.