A THERMODYNAMIC STUDY OF HOMOGENEOUS NUCLEATION

A thermodynamic study of homogeneous nucleation is presented. A thermodynamic equilibrium condition sufficiently general to be applied to any closed system is presented and then used to describe the thermodynamic equilibrium state of a liquid drop‐vapor system. The Einstein development of the theory of fluctuations is applied to homogeneous nucleation, a fluctuation phenomenon, and the thermodynamic meaning of homogeneous nucleation obtained. The activation energy for homogeneous nucleation is discussed and explicitly calculated. A peculiarity of the equilibrium state of the liquid drop‐vapor system indicating possible stability of this state is discussed. A thorough discussion of previous thermodynamic studies of homogeneous nucleation is presented in order to distinguish the correct and incorrect approaches to the problem. Copyright © 1969 by the American Geophysical Union.