Improved Determination of the b-Quark Mass at the Z Peak
  Next-to-leading order calculations of heavy quark three-jet production in e^+ e^- annihilation are reviewed. Their application for the measurement of the b-quark mass at LEP/SLC and to the test of the flavour independence of the strong coupling constant are discussed. Prospects for future improvements are studied. 
German Rodrigo (INFN, Florence), Arcadi Santamaria (Valencia U.),   Mikhail Bilenky (JINR, Dubna)