Jump Enhancement of Nucleation in Polymer and Carbon Dioxide Mixtures by Metastable Phase Transition

Abstract

We combine a newly developed density-functional theory with string method to calculate minimum free energy path of bubble nucleation in compressible poly(methyl methacrylate)-CO_2 mixtures. As increasing initial pressure in the vicinity of a metstable phase transition, the terminal nucleated state jumps from the branch of CO_2- rich-vapor phase to the branch of CO_2 -rich-liquid phase with a jump reduction for free energy barrier and radius of critical nucleus. This result suggests that the nucleation rate is enhanced as a jump discontinuous function of the initial pressure around the boundary of metastable phase transition.