Theory of Rare B Decays

Theoretical aspects of rare $B$ decays are reviewed. The focus is on the relation between short-distance interactions and physical observables. It is argued that there remain significant uncertainties in the theoretical treatment of certain important quantities. (Talk presented at the International Symposium on Vector Boson Interactions, University of California, Los Angeles, February 1-3, 1995)Comment: 12 pages, uses REVTeX with aps.sty, epsf.sty, floats.sty; 10 uuencoded .eps figures include

New Predictions for Charmed and Bottom Baryons

I review the recent proposal that there are new isotriplet heavy baryons with masses approximately 2380 MeV and 5760 MeV. This prediction follows from the application of heavy spin-flavor and light $SU(3)$ symmetries to the observed charmed and bottom baryon states. It also entails assumptions about the spin and parity quantum numbers of the observed states which are different than is commonly supposed. The discovery of such states would imply that the nonrelativistic constituent quark model is a poor predictor of heavy baryon spectroscopy. I update the analysis in light of new data which have become available.Comment: 8 pages, LaTeX, to appear in the Proceedings of the University of Illinois, Chicago, Quarkonium Workshop, June 13-15, 1996; typo on page 6 correcte