New vistas in charm production

Abstract: We discuss some new aspects of charm production trigerred by recent observations of the LHCb collaboration. The LHCb collaboration measured small asymmetries in production of $D^+ D^-$ mesons as well as $D_s^+ D_s^-$ mesons. Is this related to initial quark/antiquark asymmetries in the proton ? Here we discuss a scenario in which unfavored fragmentations $q/{\bar q} \to D$ and $s/{\bar s} \to D_s$ are responsible for the asymmetries. We fix the strength of such fragmentations -- transition probabilities, by adjusting to the size of the LHCb asymmetries. This has consequences for production of $D$ mesons in forward directions (large $x_F$) as well as at low energies. Large asymmetries are predicted then in these regions. We present here some of our predictions. Consequences for high-energy neutrino production in the atmosphere are discussed and quantified. The production of $\Lambda_c$ baryon at the LHC is disussed. Large deviations from the independent-parton fragmentation picture are found.