Physics of B_c mesons

In the framework of potential models for heavy quarkonium the mass spectrum for the system ($\bar b c$) is considered. Spin-dependent splittings, taking into account a change of a constant for effective coulomb interaction between the quarks, and widths of radiative transitions between the ($\bar b c$) levels are calculated. In the framework of QCD sum rules, masses of the lightest vector $B_c^*$ and pseudoscalar $B_c$ states are estimated, scaling relation for leptonic constants of heavy quarkonia is derived, and the leptonic constant $f_{B_c}$ is evaluated. The $B_c$ decays are considered in the framework of both the potential models and the QCD sum rules, where the significance of Coulomb-like corrections is shown. The relations, following from the approximate spin symmetry for the heavy quarks in the heavy quarkonium, are analysed for the form factors of the semileptonic weak exclusive decays of $B_c$. The $B_c$ lifetime is evaluated with the account of the corrections to the spectator mechanism of the decay, because of the quark binding into the meson. The total and differential cross sections of the $B_c$ production in different interactions are calculated. The analytic expressions for the fragmentational production cross sections of $B_c$ are derived. The possibility of the practical $B_c$ search in the current and future experiments at electron-positron and hadron colliders is analysed.Comment: 81 page, latex, ihep.sty is required and attached in the end of the file after \end{document}, figures are not availabl

Meson masses within the model of induced nonlocal quark currents

The model of induced quark currents formulated in our recent paper (Phys. Rev. D51, 176) is developed. The model being a kind of nonlocal extension of the bosonization procedure is based on the hypothesis that the QCD vacuum is realized by the (anti-)self-dual homogeneous gluon field. This vacuum field provides the analytical quark confinement. It is shown that a particular form of nonlocality of the quark and gluon propagators determined by the vacuum field, an interaction of quark spin with the vacuum gluon field and a localization of meson field at the center of masses of two quarks can explain the distinctive features of meson spectrum: Regge trajectories of radial and orbital excitations, mass splitting between pseudoscalar and vector mesons, the asymptotic mass formulas in the heavy quark limit: $M_{Q\bar Q}\to 2m_Q$ for quarkonia and $M_{Q\bar q}\to m_Q$ for heavy-light mesons. With a minimal set of parameters (quark masses, vacuum field strength and the quark-gluon coupling constant) the model describes to within ten percent inaccuracy the masses and weak decay constants of mesons from all qualitatively different regions of the spectrum.Comment: 31 pages, LaTe