Volumes of critical bubbles from the nucleation theorem.

A corollary of the nucleation theorem due to Kashchiev [Nucleation: Basic Theory with Applications (Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford, 2000)] allows the volume V(*) of a critical bubble to be determined from nucleation rate measurements. The original derivation was limited to one-component, ideal gas bubbles with a vapor density much smaller than that of the ambient liquid. Here, an exact result is found for multicomponent, nonideal gas bubbles. Provided a weak density inequality holds, this result reduces to Kashchiev's simple form which thus has a much broader range of applicability than originally expected. Limited applications to droplets are also mentioned, and the utility of the p(T,x) form of the nucleation theorem as a sum rule is noted.