Binary homogeneous nucleation theory for the gas–liquid transition: A nonclassical approach

We have employed density functional theory to study gas–liquid nucleation in binary fluids. Effects of surface enrichment and curvature are naturally included in this novel statistical mechanical approach, allowing the classical capillarity approximation to be tested. In this paper we apply the theory to mixtures of Lennard-Jones fluids (modeled on argon and krypton). For these nearly ideal mixtures, the magnitude of nonclassical effects tend to be small, but systematic deviations do appear, with the ratio of the classical to nonclassical rate showing a maximum at intermediate compositions.