I recall seeing an explanation regarding the creation of the Universe in which other Universes were called branes (short for membranes). The matter and enrgy of an individual brane would disperse over time. My understanding was that as the brane emptied out, the void was replaced as another brane imprinted itself on the now sparsley populated brane. The big bang was not a sudden expansion ot space and matter but rather the shock of having all of this matter instantly appearing into a nearly devoid universe. This sounds crazy to me because it seems to me that as this scenario is played time and time again, the branes would necessarily become more devoid of matter. Any help?