Hadronic observables at relativistic energies: Anything strange with strangeness?

We calculate p, ${\pi }^{\pm },$ $K^{\pm },$ and $\Lambda (+{\Sigma }^0)$ rapidity distributions and compare to experimental data from SIS to SPS energies within the Ultrarelativistic-Quantum-Molecular Dynamics and Hadron-String Dynamics transport approaches that are both based on string, quark, diquark $(q,$ $\overline{q},$ $qq,$ $\overline{q}\overline{q}),$ and hadronic degrees of freedom. The two transport models do not include any explicit phase transition to a quark-gluon plasma. It is found that both approaches agree rather well with each other and with the experimental rapidity distributions for protons, Λ’s, ${\pi }^{\pm },$ and $K^{\pm }.$ In spite of this apparent agreement both transport models fail to reproduce the maximum in the excitation function for the ratio $K^{+}/{\pi }^{+}$ found experimentally between 11 and 40 A GeV. A comparison to the various experimental data shows that this “failure” is dominantly due to an insufficient description of pion rapidity distributions rather than missing “strangeness.” The modest differences in the transport model results—on the other hand—can be attributed to different implementations of string formation and fragmentation that are not sufficiently controlled by experimental data for the “elementary” reactions in vacuum.