Charm Physics - Like Botticelli in the Sistine Chapel

Abstract

After sketching heavy quark expansions as applied to heavy flavour decays I emphasize the relevance of nonperturbative dynamics at the charm scale for exclusive $b\to c$ modes. I address the issue of quark-hadron duality for charm and discuss both the experimental and theoretical status of $D^0-\bar D^0$ oscillations. Finally I argue that comprehensive CP studies of charm decays provide novel portals to New Physics and suggest benchmark figures for desirable sensitivities.