Strange resonance production: probing chemical and thermal freeze-out in relativistic heavy ion collisions

The production and the observability of Λ(1520), K0(892) Φ and Δ(1232) hadron resonances in central Pb+Pb collisions at 160 A GeV is addressed. The rescattering probabilities of the resonance decay products in the evolution are studied. Strong changes in the reconstructable particle yields and spectra between chemical and thermal freeze-out are estimated. Abundances and spectra of reconstructable resonances are predicted.