The nucleate boiling regime is important to engineers because of the high heat fluxes possible with moderate temperature differences. The data can be correlated by an equation of the form
Where  is the Nusselt number, defined as:
where: 
* is the total heat flux, 
* is the maximum bubble diameter as it leaves the surface, 
* is the excess temperature, 
* is the thermal conductivity of the liquid,
* is the Prandtl number of the liquid, 
* is the bubble Reynolds number,  where:
** is the average mass velocity of the vapor leaving the surface
** is the liquid viscosity.
Rohsenow has developed the first and most widely used correlation for nucleate boiling,
where:
* is the specific heat of the liquid,
* is the surface fluid combination and vary for various combinations of fluid and surface,
* is the surface tension of the liquid-vapor interface. 
The variable  depends on the surface fluid combination and typically has a value of 1.0 or 1.7. For example, water and nickel have a  of 0.006 and  of 1.0.