Ice nucleation in supercooled water under shear

Classical nucleation theory (CNT) provides a good framework for understanding the nucleation phenomenon in metastable conditions. However, there is still no satisfactory understanding of the shear effect. Here, we propose an ice nucleation model considering the rebounded deformation energy to analyze the ice nucleation rate. It is concluded that: (1) The effect is more pronounced by changing the contact angle to regulate the free energy when both the supercooled degree and the shear rate are small. (2) The variation trend of the nucleation ratio Jhet,sh/ Jhet,no increases at first but it may decrease when the contact angle is small, or keeps increasing when the contact angle is large. (3) The probability of the shear nucleation is about several ten orders of magnitude to that of static nucleation. (4) The key factor in the acceleration of the supercooled liquid nucleation is the released deformation energy after encountering the obstruction.