Theory of nucleation in viscoelastic media: application to phase formation in glassforming melts

Glassforming melts behave, in the vicinity of the temperature of vitrification Tg, as viscoelastic bodies. A general theory of nucleation in a viscoelastic body developed elsewhere is applicable to the description of phase formation processes in such systems. The present contribution is directed to the demonstration of the relevance of this proposed general theory to describing phase transformation processes in glassforming melts. The application of the theory is shown to explain a number of experimental results on crystallization of glassforming melts, which have not found a satisfactory interpretation so far.