phi production at RHIC: characterization of co-existence phase

We extract the effective degrees of freedom that characterize the co-existing phase of quark gluon plasma and hadrons. Experimental data on phi at mid-rapidity is used to set a lower bound to the critical temperature of quark hadron phase transition. The production and evolution of strangeness have been studied by using Boltzmann equation. The results have been contrasted with the experimental data obtained by STAR collaboration at RHIC for Au + Au collisions at sqrt{s_{NN}}=200 GeV. Our study reveals that the phi mesons freeze out at a temperature ~ 160 MeV, a value close to the transition temperature for quark-hadron phase transition.