Seed concentration effect on heterogeneous nucleation by molecular dynamics

Heterogeneous nucleation in a system with multiple seeds was conducted by molecular dynamics to understand how seed concentrations can affect the phase transition process. A constant particle number, volume, and temperature ensemble was applied to multiple systems of Lennard-Jones particles with a carrier gas that acts as a thermal reservoir. Different numbers of seeds were inserted into systems that have been previously found to have no spontaneous nucleation due to low supersaturation ratios. The addition of the seeds activated nucleation, but the increase in the nucleation rate was not perpetual because the system size was finite. A clear understanding of how the number of seeds decreases the free energy barrier is presented along with kinetic attachment and detachment rate variations. The decrease in the free energy barrier has a limit similar to the aforementioned nucleation rate increase. The seed concentration results coincide with the predictions from the classical nucleation theory.