Homogeneous Nucleation in a Critical Binary Fluid Mixture

Abstract

We have studied homogeneous nucleation in a binary fluid mixture near the critical point for a temperature range $2\times {10}^{-5\mathrm{}}<\epsilon <2\mathrm{}\times {10}^{-2\mathrm{}}$, where $\epsilon =\frac{(T_c-T)}{T_c}$. We find that the measured degree of critical supercooling is in good agreement with the predictions of a nucleation theory with a nonclassical free energy proposed by Sarkies and Frankel. A slight difference between the temperature dependence of the nucleation curve and that of the coexistence curve is also observed.