If the deconfinement phase transformation of strongly interacting matter is of first-order and the expanding chromodynamic matter created in a high-energy nuclear collision enters the corresponding region of phase coexistence, a spinodal phase separation might occur. The matter would then condense into a number of separate blobs, each having a particular net strangeness that would remain approximately conserved during the further evolution. We investigate the effect that such `strangeness trapping may have on strangeness-related hadronic observables. The kaon multiplicity fluctuations are significantly enhanced and thus provide a possible tool for probing the nature of the phase transition experimentally.
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