Non-equilibrium theory of nucleation at first order phase transitions.

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Nucleation is commonly modeled by means of quasi-equilibrium approaches such as classical nucleation theory or transition state theory. These approaches neglect the inherentnon-equilibrium nature of phase transition processes and, in particular, memory effects.We have recently derived a theory for the nucleation process by means of a time-dependentprojection operator formalism, thus fully taking into account the non-equilibrium natureof the problem. Up to now, we only know the general mathematical structure of thistheory. In the proposed project we plan to apply the theory to concrete systems (systemswith Lennard-Jones and Asakura-Oosawa interactions). Our aim is, in particular, to identifiy sources of memory-effects. The theoretical work will be accompanied by computersimulations to test the theoretical predictions.