Hadronic gas chiral phase transition within generalized chiral perturbation theory

We study the temperature evolution of the {l_angle}{bar q}q{r_angle} condensate below the chiral phase transition. The hadronic gas is described using a virial expansion within generalized chiral perturbation theory. In such a way, we can implement both the large or small chiral condensate scenarios and analyze the condensate dependence on the values of the lightest quark masses. {copyright} {ital 1998} {ital The American Physical Society}