Positronium Nanocavities in Liquids
D. I. Zhukhovitskii
Institute of High Temperatures,
Russian Academy of Sciences,
Izhorskaya ul. 13/19, Moscow, 125412 Russia
Abstract—The model of a strongly curved vapor–liquid interface developed earlier is applied to the description of positronium nanocavities in liquids. It is shown, for the first time, that it is possible on the basis of this model to calculate the lifetime of a positronium in a cavity and its radius without introducing additional adjustment parameters. The resultant values agree satisfactorily with the experimental data. The radii of nanocavities calculated according to the proposed model are noticeably higher than those obtained on the basis of the classical theory of nucleation. Using water and liquid argon as examples, the possibility of describing the experimental data on nanocavities in liquids and velocities of homogeneous nucleation in a supersaturated vapor is demonstrated from the general standpoint.