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Recently, the EMPRESS Collaboration has included new data in the extraction of the primordial ${}^4\mathrm{He}$abundance from big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN), resulting in a determination that differs from the previous value and from theoretical expectations. There have been several studies attempting to explain this anomaly which involve variation of fundamental constants between the time of BBN and the present. Since the Higgs vacuum expectation value (vev) is the only dimensionful parameter in the Standard Model and it is already known to vary during the electroweak phase transition, we consider the possibility that the vev is slightly different during BBN compared to its present value. A modification of the vev changes not only particle masses but also affects, through mass thresholds, the QCD confinement scale. We use the recently developed yordial program to study this variation and its impact on the ${}^4\mathrm{He}$and deuterium abundances. We find that bounds on $|\delta v/v|$are approximately 0.01, and that the EMPRESS result can be explained within $2\sigma$if $0.008<\delta v/v<0.02$, but at the cost of worsening the current $2\sigma$discrepancy in the deuterium abundance to over $3\sigma$. Published by the American Physical Society2024 

Abstract In this work we present : A package dedicated to efficient computations of observables in the Early Universe with the focus on the cosmological era of Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN). The code offers fast and precise evaluation of BBN light-element abundances together with the effective number of relativistic degrees of freedom, including non-instantaneous decoupling effects. is suitable for state-of-the-art analyses in the Standard Model as well as for general investigations into New Physics active during BBN. After reviewing the physics implemented in , we provide a short guide on how to use the code for applications in the Standard Model and beyond. The package is written in Python, but more advanced users can optionally take advantage of the open-source community for Julia. is publicly available on GitHub.