  The effect of a non-zero strangeness chemical potential on the strong
interaction phase diagram has been studied within the framework of the SU(3)
quark-hadron chiral parity-doublet model. Both, the nuclear liquid-gas and the
chiral/deconfinement phase transitions are modified. The first-order line in
the chiral phase transition is observed to vanish completely, with the entire
phase boundary becoming a crossover. These changes in the nature of the phase
transitions are expected to modify various susceptibilities, the effects of
which might be detectable in particle-number distributions resulting from
moderate-temperature and high-density heavy-ion collision experiments.
