Perturbative and Non-Perturbative Issues in Heavy Quark Fragmentation

We review the state-of-the-art of our understanding of heavy quark fragmentation. Recent e^+e^- data for B mesons are compared to the most up-to-date theoretical predictions, and the need for inclusion of a non-perturbative component is discussed. Experimental analyses in moments space are suggested, and it is pointed out how perturbative and non-perturbative contributions are to be properly matched. Failure to do so can result in large phenomenological discrepancies. An example is given for B^+ hadroproduction at the Tevatron.Comment: 6 pages, LaTeX2e, Talk given at the 37th Rencontres de Moriond on QCD and Hadronic Interactions, Les Arcs, France, 16-23 March 2002. To be published in the Proceeding

QCD Predictions for Charm and Bottom Production at RHIC

We present up-to-date QCD predictions for open charm and bottom production at RHIC in nucleon-nucleon collisions at \sqrt{S} = 200 GeV. The electron spectrum resulting from heavy flavor decays is also evaluated for direct comparison to the PHENIX and STAR data. These predictions seek to establish a rigorous benchmark, including the theoretical uncertainties, against which nuclear collision data can be compared to obtain evidence for nuclear effects.Comment: 4 pages, to appear in the proceedings of the International Europhysics Conference on High Energy Physics, 21-27 July 2005, Lisbon, Portuga

Heavy Quark Production: Theory vs. Experiment

The current status of the comparisons between some experimental results and theoretical predictions for heavy quark production is reviewed. It is shown that the combination of new theoretical tools and better experimental input allows for a good description of charm, bottom and top hadroproduction, with no significant discrepancies between theory and experiment. Theoretical progress in the resummation of large logarithms and inclusion of power corrections for the heavy quark fragmentation function is also discussed.Comment: 6 pages, LaTeX, Talk given at the Workshop on High Energy Physics IFAE 2003, Lecce, Italy, 23-26 April 200

The LEP Trail to Non-Perturbative QCD

This talk summarizes the presentations given in the Hadronic Physics session at the LEPTRE meeting, emphasizing the importance of LEP data in our quest for a successful approach to non-perturbative QCD.Comment: 6 pages, Latex, epsfig. Summary talk of the Hadronic Physics session of the LEPTRE meeting. Rome, April 2001. To be published in the Proceeding

Soft-Gluon Resummation in Heavy Quarkonium Physics

Soft-gluon resummation within the framework of heavy quarkonium hadroproduction is considered. A few selected cases are studied in detail. A sizeable increase of the cross sections with respect to the next-to-leading order predictions with central factorization/renormalization scale choice can generally be observed. Improvements in the dependence of the cross sections on the two scales, especially when they are kept equal, are also found.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, LaTeX2

Rise and Fall of the Bottom Quark Production Excess

We review the history of comparisons between bottom production measurements and QCD predictions. We challenge the existence of a `significant discrepancy', and argue that standard approaches to QCD calculations do a good job in describing the experimental findings.Comment: Talk given at the La Thuile (February 2004), Moriond QCD (March 2004), IFAE (April 2004) and Loops and Legs (April 2004) conferences. To be published, in slightly modified forms, in their respective Proceeding