Effect of transient condensation of a supercooled gas on the size distribution of new-phase particles

The homogeneous nucleation of the liquid phase upon rapid cooling of a gas is considered in the framework of the Zel'dovich–Frenkel theory, and the time-dependent distribution function of nuclei in size space and the nucleation rate are determined. It is shown that in the transient case a certain modification must be made to the basic kinetic equation at high supersaturations of the gas to allow for the discrete number of molecules in a nucleus. The form of the distribution function is found in the leading and next-higher approximations in the reciprocal of the activation barrier. Comparison with a numerical simulation shows that the results are quite accurate.