Strange mesons from quark and hadron matter: a comparison

In a simplified model we study the hadronization of quark matter in an expanding fireball, in particular the approach to a final hadronic composition in equilibrium. Ideal hadron gas equilibrium constrained by conservation laws, the fugacity parametrization, as well as linear and non-linear coalescence approaches are recognized as different approximations to this in-medium quark fusion process. It is shown that color confinement requires a dependence of the hadronization cross section on quark density in the presence of flow (dynamical confinement).