Nucleation of colloids and macromolecules in a finite volume

Abstract

A recently formulated description of homogeneous nucleation for Brownian particles in the over-damped limit based on fluctuating hydrodynamics is used to determine the nucleation pathway, characterized as the most likely path (MLP), for the nucleation of a dense-concentration droplet of globular protein from a dilute solution in a small, finite container. The calculations are performed by directly discretizing the equations for the MLP and it is found that they confirm previous results obtained for infinite systems: the process of homogeneous nucleation begins with a long-wavelength, spatially-extended concentration fluctuation that it condenses to form the pre-critical cluster. This is followed by a classical growth processes. The calculations show that the post-critical growth involves the formation of a depletion zone around the cluster whereas no such depletion is observed in the pre-critical cluster. The approach therefore captures dynamical effects not found in classical Density Functional Theory studies while consistently describing the formation of the pre-critical cluster.

References in corpus (4)

• Density Functional Theory of Inhomogeneous Liquids: III. Liquid-Vapor Nucleation
• Density Functional Theory of Inhomogeneous Liquids IV. Squared-gradient approximation and Classical Nucleation Theory
• Theoretical description of the nucleation of vapor bubbles in a superheated fluid
• Nucleation of colloids and macromolecules in a finite volume

Cited by in corpus (4)

• How crystals form: A theory of nucleation pathways
• A Two-parameter Extension of Classical Nucleation Theory
• Nucleation of colloids and macromolecules in a finite volume
• Fluids confined in wedges and by edges: From cluster integrals to thermodynamic properties referred to different regions