The ALICE experiment studies nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC in order
to investigate the properties of QCD matter at extreme energy densities. The
measurement of open charm and open beauty production allows to investigate the
interaction of heavy quarks with the hot and dense medium formed in high-energy
nucleus-nucleus collisions. In particular, in-medium energy loss is predicted
to be different for gluons, light quarks and heavy quarks and to depend on the
medium energy density and size. ALICE has measured open heavy-flavour particle
production at central rapidity in several decay channels in Pb-Pb and pp
collisions at sqrt{s_NN} = 2.76 TeV and sqrt{s} = 2.76, 7 TeV respectively. The
results obtained from the reconstruction of D meson decays at central rapidity
and from electrons from heavy-flavour hadron decay will be presented.Comment: Proceedings of the International Conference "Primordial QCD Matter in
LHC Era -Implication of QCD results on the early universe", El Cairo, 4th-8th
December 201