Phase transitions in systems small enough to be clusters

A detailed characterization of the formation of a liquid drop in a finite sized container was carried out. The classical thermodynamic description of this system was revisited. The required statistical mechanical arguments were introduced to extend the description to small scales. The results lead to the conclusion that, with a proper combination of thermodynamic concepts and statistical mechanics, it is possible to reproduce the behavior of a really small system surprisingly well, under conditions such that the extrapolation of macroscopic thermodynamic ideas alone is supposed to fail badly.