# 1 𝑀⁢(𝑝²):=𝐵⁢(𝑝²)/𝐴⁢(𝑝²) obtained in solving the quark DSE. The solution of 𝑀²⁢(𝑝²)=𝑝² defines 𝑀^𝐸, the Euclidean constituent-quark mass.

## Abstract

Dyson-Schwinger equation (DSE) studies show that the $`b`$-quark mass-function is approximately constant, and that this is true to a lesser extent for the $`c`$-quark. These observations provide the basis for a study of the leptonic and semileptonic decays of heavy pseudoscalar mesons using a “heavy-quark” limit of the DSEs. When exact, this limit reduces the number of independent form factors. Semileptonic decays with light mesons in the final state are also accessible because the DSEs provide a description of light-quark propagation characteristics and light-meson structure. A description of $`B`$-meson decays is straightforward, however, the study of decays involving the $`D`$-meson indicates that $`c`$-quark mass-corrections are quantitatively important.

Heavy Meson Observables and   
Dyson-Schwinger Equations   
M. A. Ivanov,<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>footnotemark: 1 Yu. L. Kalinovsky,<sup>2</sup><sup>2</sup>footnotemark: 2 P. Maris <sup>3</sup><sup>3</sup>footnotemark: 3 and C. D. Roberts <sup>4</sup><sup>4</sup>footnotemark: 4   
<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>footnotemark: 1Bogoliubov Laboratory of Theoretical Physics,   
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, 141980 Dubna, Russia   
<sup>2</sup><sup>2</sup>footnotemark: 2Laboratory of Computing Techniques and Automation,   
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, 141980 Dubna, Russia   
<sup>3</sup><sup>3</sup>footnotemark: 3Center for Nuclear Research, Physics Department, Kent State University,   
Kent Ohio 44242, USA   
<sup>4</sup><sup>4</sup>footnotemark: 4Physics Division, Bldg. 203, Argonne National Laboratory,   
Argonne Illinois 60439, USA 

Dyson-Schwinger equations provide a nonperturbative, Poincaré invariant, continuum approach to studying quantum field theories: two familiar examples are the gap equation in superconductivity and the Bethe-Salpeter equation describing relativistic 2-body bound states. As a system of coupled integral equations, a truncation of the DSEs is necessary to obtain a tractable problem. The simplest truncation scheme is a weak-coupling expansion, which generates every diagram in perturbation theory. Hence, in the intelligent application of DSEs to QCD, there is a tight constraint on the ultraviolet behaviour of the Schwinger functions (dressed-propagators and vertices). That is crucial in extrapolating into the infrared, in constructing uniformly valid symmetry-preserving truncations, and in developing phenomenological models necessary for anticipating the results of the current generation of hadron physics facilities.

The development of efficacious truncations is not a purely algebraic task, and neither is it always obviously systematic. Nevertheless, it has become clear  that truncations which preserve the global symmetries of a theory; for example, chiral symmetry in QCD, are relatively easy to define and implement and, while it is more difficult to preserve local gauge symmetries, much progress has been made with Abelian theories  and more is being learnt about non-Abelian ones. In addition, contemporary phenomenological applications now address a wide range of observables , yielding qualitatively robust results and a much-needed intuitive understanding of many observables inaccessible in perturbation theory.

A salient feature of the phenomenological application of DSEs is the significant role played by the necessary momentum-dependent modification of gluon and quark propagators: they are modified in perturbation theory and this modification persists and grows in the nonperturbative domain. For example, in a general covariant gauge the dressed-gluon propagator is characterised by a single scalar function, which we denote $`𝒟(k^2)`$. Many studies of the gluon DSE show that $`𝒟(k^2)`$ is strongly enhanced in the infrared; i.e, its behaviour in the vicinity of $`k^2=0`$ can be represented as a distribution , while for $`k^2>1`$-$`2`$GeV<sup>2</sup> the perturbative result is reliable. With such behaviour manifest in the quark-quark interaction, dynamical chiral symmetry breaking (DCSB) and confinement follow without fine-tuning .

These phenomena can be addressed through the DSE for the dressed-quark propagator:

$$S(p):=\frac{1}{i\gamma p+\mathrm{\Sigma }(p)}=\frac{1}{i\gamma pA(p^2)+B(p^2)}=i\gamma p\sigma _V(p^2)+\sigma _S(p^2),$$
(1)   
where $`\mathrm{\Sigma }(p)`$ is the renormalised dressed-quark self energy, which satisfies

$$\mathrm{\Sigma }(p)=(Z_21)i\gamma p+Z_4m^\zeta +Z_1_q^\mathrm{\Lambda }g^2D_{\mu \nu }(pq)\frac{\lambda ^a}{2}\gamma _\mu S(q)\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu ^a(q,p),$$
(2)   
with $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_\nu ^a(q;p)`$ the dressed-quark-gluon vertex, $`m^\zeta `$ the current-quark mass, $`Z_1`$, $`Z_2`$ and $`Z_4`$ renormalisation constants, and $`\zeta `$ the renormalisation point. $`_q^\mathrm{\Lambda }:=^\mathrm{\Lambda }d^4q/(2\pi )^4`$ represents mnemonically a translationally-invariant regularisation of the integral, with $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ the regularisation mass-scale. With the infrared-enhanced interaction introduced in Ref.  and current-quark masses corresponding to

$$\begin{array}{cccc}m_{u,d}^{1\mathrm{GeV}}\hfill & m_s^{1\mathrm{GeV}}\hfill & m_c^{1\mathrm{GeV}}\hfill & m_b^{1\mathrm{GeV}}\hfill \\ 6.6\mathrm{MeV}\hfill & 140\mathrm{MeV}\hfill & 1.0\mathrm{GeV}\hfill & 3.4\mathrm{GeV}\hfill \end{array}$$
(3)   
one obtains  the dressed-quark mass function depicted in Fig. 1.

It is clear that for light quarks ($`u`$, $`d`$ and $`s`$) there are two distinct domains: perturbative and nonperturbative. In the perturbative domain the magnitude of $`M(p^2)`$ is governed by the the current-quark mass, while for $`p^2<1`$GeV<sup>2</sup> the mass-function rises sharply. This is the nonperturbative domain where the magnitude of $`M(p^2)`$ is determined by the DCSB mechanism; i.e., the enhancement in the dressed-gluon propagator.

For a given flavour, the ratio $`_f:=M_f^E/m_f^\zeta `$ is a single, quantitative measure of the importance of the DCSB mechanism in modifying that quark’s propagation characteristics. As illustrated in Eq. (4),

$$\begin{array}{cccccc}\text{flavour}\hfill & u,d& s& c& b& t\\ & & & & & \\ \frac{M^E}{m^{\zeta 20\mathrm{GeV}}}\hfill & 150& 10& 2.3& 1.4& 1\end{array}$$
(4)   
this ratio provides a natural classification of quarks as either light or heavy. For light-quarks $`_f`$ is characteristically $`10`$-$`100`$ while for heavy-quarks it is only $`1`$-$`2`$. The values of $`_f`$ signal the existence of a characteristic DCSB mass-scale: $`M_\chi `$. At $`p^2>0`$ the propagation characteristics of a flavour with $`m_f^\zeta <M_\chi `$ are significantly altered by the DCSB mechanism, while for flavours with $`m_f^\zeta M_\chi `$ it is irrelevant, and explicit chiral symmetry breaking dominates. It is apparent that $`M_\chi 0.2`$GeV$`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}}`$.

This forms the basis for a simplification of the study of heavy-meson observables  that we summarise herein. It motivates an exploration of the fidelity of the approximation

$$S_{c,b}(p)=\frac{1}{i\gamma p+\widehat{M}_{c,b}},$$
(5)   
where $`\widehat{M}_{c,b}M_{c,b}^E`$, so that with $`p_\mu :=m_Hv_\mu :=(\widehat{M}_{f_Q}+E)v_\mu ,`$ the heavy-quark propagator is

$$S_{c,b}(k+p)=\frac{1}{2}\frac{1i\gamma v}{kvE}+\mathrm{O}(\frac{|k|}{\widehat{M}_{c,b}},\frac{E}{\widehat{M}_{c,b}}).$$
(6)   
($`v_\mu `$ is the heavy meson velocity, $`v^2=1`$, and $`E>0`$ is the difference between the heavy-meson mass and the effective-mass of the heavy-quark.) Many simplifications follow from neglecting the $`1/\widehat{M}`$-corrections; e.g., it reduces the number of independent form factors required to describe heavy-meson $``$ heavy-meson decays, relating them to a minimal number of so-called “universal” form factors, which is a characteristic feature of “heavy-quark” symmetry . The magnitude of $`M_b^E`$ makes it likely that Eq. (6) is reliable for the $`b`$-quark, however, in employing the same reduction for the $`c`$-quark, one may expect quantitatively important corrections.

The light quark propagators are not limited in this way. They retain their full momentum dependence, which is efficaciously characterised in the parametrisation 

$`\overline{\sigma }_S^f(x)`$ $`=`$ $`2\overline{m}_f(2(x+\overline{m}_f^2))+(b_1x)(b_3x)\left(b_0^f+b_2^f(ϵx)\right),`$ (7)   
$`\overline{\sigma }_V^f(x)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{2(x+\overline{m}_f^2)1+e^{2(x+\overline{m}_f^2)}}{2(x+\overline{m}_f^2)^2}},`$ (8)   
where: $`f=u,s`$ (isospin symmetry is assumed); $`(y):=(1\mathrm{e}^y)/y`$; $`x=p^2/(2D)`$; $`\overline{m}_f`$ = $`m_f/\sqrt{2D}`$; and

$`\overline{\sigma }_S^f(x):=\sqrt{2D}\sigma _S^f(p^2),`$ $`\overline{\sigma }_V^f(x):=2D\sigma _V^f(p^2),`$ (9)   
with $`D`$ a mass scale. This algebraic form combines the effects of confinement and dynamical chiral symmetry breaking with free-particle (asymptotically-free) behaviour at large, spacelike-$`p^2`$. The parameters: $`\overline{m}_f`$, $`b_{0\mathrm{}3}^f`$. in Eqs. (7) and (8) take the values

$$\begin{array}{cccccc}& \overline{m}_f& b_0^f& b_1^f& b_2^f& b_3^f\\ & & & & & \\ u:& 0.00897& 0.131& 2.90& 0.603& 0.185\\ s:& 0.224& 0.105& \underset{¯}{2.90}& 0.740& \underset{¯}{0.185}\end{array},$$
(10)   
which were determined  in a least-squares fit to a range of light-hadron observables. The values of $`b_{1,3}^s`$ are underlined to indicate that the constraints $`b_{1,3}^s=b_{1,3}^u`$ were imposed. The scale parameter $`D=0.160`$GeV<sup>2</sup>.

The heavy-quark expansion introduced above can be employed in the analysis of semileptonic pseudoscalar $``$ pseudoscalar decays: $`P_{H_1}(p_1)P_{H_2}(p_2)\mathrm{}\nu ,`$ where $`P_{H_1}`$ represents either a $`B`$ or $`D`$ meson with momentum $`p_1`$ $`(p_1^2=m_{H_1}^2)`$ and $`P_{H_2}`$ can be a $`D`$, $`K`$ or $`\pi `$ meson with momentum $`p_2`$ $`(p_2^2=m_{H_2}^2)`$. (Light $``$ light transitions are discussed in Ref. .) The invariant amplitude describing the decay is

$$A(P_{H_1}P_{H_2}\mathrm{}\nu )=\frac{G_F}{\sqrt{2}}V_{qQ}\overline{\mathrm{}}\gamma _\mu (1\gamma _5)\nu M_\mu ^{P_{H_1}P_{H_2}}(p_1,p_2),$$
(11)   
where $`G_F`$ is the Fermi weak-decay constant, $`V_{qQ}`$ is the appropriate element of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix ($`q`$ denotes a light-quark and $`Q`$ a heavy-quark) and the hadronic current is

$$M_\mu ^{P_{H_1}P_{H_2}}(p_1,p_2):=P_{H_2}(p_2)|\overline{q}\gamma _\mu Q|P_{H_1}(p_1)=f_+(t)(p_1+p_2)_\mu +f_{}(t)q_\mu ,$$
(12)   
with $`t:=q^2:=(p_1p_2)^2`$. The form factors, $`f_\pm (t)`$, contain all the information about strong interaction effects in these processes and their accurate estimation is essential to the extraction of $`V_{qQ}`$ from a measurement of a semileptonic decay rate. In impulse approximation

$`M_\mu ^{P_{H_1}P_{H_2}}(p_1,p_2)=`$   
$`{\displaystyle \frac{N_c}{16\pi ^4}}{\displaystyle d^4k\mathrm{tr}\left[\overline{\mathrm{\Gamma }}_{H_2}(k;p_2)S_q(k+p_2)i\gamma _\mu S_Q(k+p_1)\mathrm{\Gamma }_{H_1}(k;p_1)S_q^{}(k)\right]}.`$   
Hitherto unspecified in Eq. (S0.Ex1) are $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{H_1}(k;p_1)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{H_2}(k;p_2)`$, the meson Bethe-Salpeter amplitudes. They can be obtained by solving the Bethe-Salpeter equation in a truncation consistent with that employed in the quark DSE. However, since for light-quarks we have parametrised that solution, we follow Ref.  and do the same for the light-meson amplitude; i.e., for the $`\pi `$\- and $`K`$-mesons we assume $`\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\pi ,K}(k;P)=i\gamma _5_{\pi ,K}(k^2)`$ and employ the algebraic parametrisation :

$$_{\pi ,K}(k^2)=\frac{\sqrt{2}}{f_{\pi ,K}}\frac{C_0\mathrm{e}^{k^2/[2D]}+\sigma _S(k^2)|_{m_f=0}}{\sigma _V(k^2)|_{m_f=0}},$$
(14)   
which in concert with Eqs. (7) and (8) provides an efficacious algebraic representation of $`\chi _{\pi ,K}(k;P):=S(q+P/2)\mathrm{\Gamma }_{\pi ,K}(k;P)S(qP/2)`$. $`C_0=0.214`$GeV is chosen to yield a calculated value $`f_\pi =0.131`$. $`f_K=0.160`$GeV.

For a heavy-meson, Bethe-Salpeter equation studies  suggest the Ansatz

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }_{H_f}(k;p_1)=\gamma _5\left(1+\frac{1}{2}i\gamma v\right)\frac{1}{𝒩_{H_f}}\phi (k^2),$$
(15)   
where, using Eq. (6), the canonical normalisation condition is

$$𝒩_{H_f}^2=\frac{1}{m_{H_f}}\frac{N_c}{32\pi ^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑u\phi (z)^2\left(\sigma _S^f(z)+\sqrt{u}\sigma _V^f(z)\right):=\frac{1}{m_{H_f}\kappa _f^2},$$
(16)   
with $`z=u2E\sqrt{u}`$ and $`f`$ labelling the light-quark flavour. In a solution of the Bethe-Salpeter equation the form of $`\phi (k^2)`$ is completely determined. However, here it characterises our Ansatz and we choose

$$\phi (k^2)=\mathrm{exp}\left(k^2/\mathrm{\Lambda }^2\right),$$
(17)   
where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is a free parameter. As long as $`\phi (k^2)`$ is a non-negative, non-increasing function of $`k^2`$, calculated results are insensitive to its detailed form. The leptonic decay constant in the heavy-quark limit is straightforward to determine once the Bethe-Salpeter amplitude is known:

$$f_{H_f}=\frac{\kappa _f}{\sqrt{m_{H_f}}}\frac{N_c}{8\pi ^2}_0^{\mathrm{}}𝑑u(\sqrt{u}E)\phi (z)\left[\sigma _S^f(z)+\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{u\sigma _V^f}(z)\right],$$
(18)   
from which it is clear that

$$f_{H_f}\sqrt{m_{H_f}}=\mathrm{const}.$$
(19)   
From Eqs. (6), (15), (16) and (19), and the pseudoscalar meson mass formula :

$`f_Hm_H^2`$ $`=`$ $`_H^\zeta r_H^\zeta ,_H:=\mathrm{tr}_{\mathrm{flavour}}\left[M_{(\zeta )}\{T^H,\left(T^H\right)^\mathrm{t}\}\right],`$ (20)   
$`ir_H^\zeta `$ $`=`$ $`Z_4{\displaystyle ^\mathrm{\Lambda }}{\displaystyle \frac{d^4q}{(2\pi )^4}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\mathrm{tr}\left[\left(T^H\right)^\mathrm{t}\gamma _5𝒮(q_+)\mathrm{\Gamma }_H(q;P)𝒮(q_{})\right],`$ (21)   
where $`M_{(\zeta )}=\mathrm{diag}(m_u^\zeta ,m_d^\zeta ,m_s^\zeta ,\mathrm{})`$ and $`T^H`$ is a flavour matrix identifying the channel under consideration, it also follows  that

$$m_{H_f}\widehat{m}_Q$$
(22)   
in the heavy-quark limit, where $`\widehat{m}_Q`$ is the renormalisation point invariant current-quark mass. The linear trajectory becomes apparent for $`m_Hm_K`$ . In contrast, for small current-quark masses, Eq. (20) yields what is commonly known as the Gell-Mann–Oakes–Renner relation. Thus, in Eq. (20) one has a single, exact formula that provides a unified description of light- and heavy-meson masses.

Using Eqs. (6) and (15) one finds  from Eqs. (12) and (S0.Ex1) that the $`B_fD_f`$ decay is particularly simple to study in the heavy-quark limit. It is described by one form factor:

$`f_\pm (t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}{\displaystyle \frac{m_{D_f}\pm m_{B_f}}{\sqrt{m_{D_f}m_{B_f}}}}\xi _f(w),`$ (23)   
$`\xi _f(w)`$ $`=`$ $`\kappa _f^2{\displaystyle \frac{N_c}{32\pi ^2}}{\displaystyle _0^1}𝑑\tau {\displaystyle \frac{1}{W}}{\displaystyle _0^{\mathrm{}}}𝑑u\phi (z_W)^2\left[\sigma _S^f(z_W)+\sqrt{{\displaystyle \frac{u}{W}}}\sigma _V^f(z_W)\right],`$ (24)   
with $`W=1+2\tau (1\tau )(w1)`$, $`z_W=u2E\sqrt{u/W}`$ and

$$w=\frac{m_{B_f}^2+m_{D_f}^2t}{2m_{B_f}m_{D_f}}=v_{B_f}v_{D_f}.$$
(25)   
The minimum physical value of $`w`$ is $`w_{\mathrm{min}}=1`$, which corresponds to maximum momentum transfer with the final state meson at rest; the maximum value is $`w_{\mathrm{max}}(m_{B_f}^2+m_{D_f}^2)/(2m_{B_f}m_{D_f})=1.6`$, which corresponds to maximum recoil of the final state meson with the charged lepton at rest. The canonical normalisation of the Bethe-Salpeter amplitude, Eq. (16), automatically ensures that

$$\xi _f(w=1)=1.$$
(26)   
Equation (23) illustrates a general result: in the heavy-quark limit, the semileptonic decays of heavy mesons are described by a single, universal function: $`\xi _f(w)`$.

The analysis of heavy $``$ light decays is more difficult because, as remarked above, the current-quark mass of the $`u`$\- and $`s`$-quarks $`m_{u/s}M_\chi O(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{\mathrm{QCD}})`$. Hence the momentum-dependent modification of the dressed-quark propagator cannot be ignored, and the description of these decays requires a good understanding of light-quark propagation characteristics and the internal structure of light-mesons. The form factor that determines the width is

$$f_+^{H_1H_2}(t)=\kappa _q^{}\frac{\sqrt{2}}{f_{H_2}}\frac{N_c}{32\pi ^2}F_q^{}(t;E,m_{H_1},m_{H_2}),$$
(27)   
where

$$F_q^{}(t;E,m_{H_1},m_{H_2})=\frac{4}{\pi }_1^1\frac{d\gamma }{\sqrt{1\gamma ^2}}_0^1𝑑\nu _0^{\mathrm{}}u^2𝑑u\phi (z_1)(z_1)W_q^{}(\gamma ,\nu ,u),$$
(28)   
$`z_1=u^22u\nu E`$, with $`W_q^{}(\gamma ,\nu ,u)`$ depending on the light-quark propagator and its derivatives .

All that is necessary for the calculation of the mesonic semileptonic heavy $``$ heavy and heavy $``$ light transition form factors, and heavy-meson leptonic decay constants is now specified. There are two free parameters: the binding energy, $`E`$, introduced after Eq. (5) and the width, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$, of the heavy meson Bethe-Salpeter amplitude, introduced in Eq. (17). The dressed light-quark propagators and light-meson Bethe-Salpeter amplitudes were completely fixed in the application of this framework to the study of $`\pi `$\- and $`K`$-meson properties. The primary goal of this study is to determine whether, with these two heavy-quark parameters, a description and correlation of existing heavy-meson data is possible using the DSE framework. Some key results are presented in Table 1, which also describes how the parameters $`(E,\mathrm{\Lambda })`$ were fixed.

The calculated form of $`\xi (w)`$ is depicted in Fig. 2. It yields a value of $`\rho ^2:=\xi ^{}(w=1)=0.870.92`$,<sup>1</sup><sup>1</sup>1 In this framework the minimum possible value for $`\rho ^2`$ is $`1/3`$ . close to that obtained with a linear fitting form , however, $`\xi (w)`$ has significant curvature and deviates quickly from that fit. The curvature is, in fact, very well matched to that of the nonlinear fit , however, the value of $`\rho ^2`$ reported in that case is very different from the calculated value. The derivation of the formula for $`\xi (w)`$ assumes that the heavy-quark limit, Eq. (6), is valid not only for the $`b`$-quark but also for the $`c`$-quark. Therefore these results suggest that the latter assumption is only accurate to approximately 20%; i.e., $`1/\widehat{M}_c`$-corrections are quantitatively important.

$`f_+^{B\pi }(t)`$ is depicted in in Fig. 3. A good interpolation of the result is provided by

$$f_+^{B\pi }(t)=\frac{0.458}{1t/m_{\mathrm{mon}}^2},m_{\mathrm{mon}}=5.67\mathrm{GeV}.$$
(29)   
This value of $`m_{\mathrm{mon}}`$ can be compared with that obtained in a fit to lattice data:  $`m_{\mathrm{mon}}=5.6\pm 0.3`$.

The calculated form of $`f_+^{DK}(t)`$ is depicted in Fig. 4. The $`t`$-dependence is also well-approximated by a monopole fit. The calculated value of $`f_+^{DK}(0)=0.62`$ is approximately 15% less than the experimental value . That is also a gauge of the size of $`1/\widehat{M}_c`$-corrections, which are expected to reduce the value of the $`D`$ and $`D_s`$ leptonic decay constants calculated in the heavy-quark limit: $`f_D=0.285`$GeV, $`f_{D_s}=0.298`$GeV. A 15% reduction yields $`f_D=0.24`$GeV and $`f_{D_s}=0.26`$GeV, values which are consistent with lattice estimates  and the latter with experiment .

It must be noted that Ref.  explicitly did not assume vector meson dominance. The calculated results reflect only the importance and influence of the dressed-quark and -gluon substructure of the heavy mesons. That substructure is manifest in the dressed propagators and bound state amplitudes, which fully determine the value of every calculated quantity. That simple-pole Ansätze provide efficacious interpolations of the calculated results on the accessible kinematic domain is not surprising, given that the form factor must rise slowly away from its value at $`t=0`$ and the heavy meson mass provides a dominant intrinsic scale, which is only modified slightly by the scale in the light-quark propagators and meson bound state amplitudes.

This presentation illustrates the phenomenological application of a heavy-quark limit of the DSEs that is based on the result that the mass function of heavy-quarks evolves slowly with momentum. Heavy-mesons are seen to be little different from light-mesons: they are bound states of finite extent with dressed-quark constituents. The results summarised here indicate that the heavy-quark limit can be used to develop a quantitatively reliable description of $`B`$-meson observables. However, it is inadequate for $`D`$-meson observables, where corrections of 15-20% can be expected. A significant feature of the DSE approach is that it provides a single framework for the correlation of heavy $``$ heavy and heavy $``$ light transitions and for their correlation with light meson observables, which are dominated by effects such as confinement and DCSB.

This work was supported in part by the Russian Fund for Fundamental Research, under contract 96-02-17435-a, and the US Department of Energy, Nuclear Physics Division, under contract no. W-31-109-ENG-38.