D^* Radiative Decays and Strong Coupling of Heavy Mesons with Soft Pions in a QCD Relativistic Potential Model

In the framework of a QCD inspired relativistic potential model, we evaluate radiative decay rates of heavy mesons and their coupling with soft pions. The agreement with the existing experimental data is satisfactory. In the limit $m_Q \to \infty$ one obtains results in agreement with the Heavy Quark Effective Theory and is able to predict the values of the relevant couplings; in particular, for the scaled $B^*B \pi$ strong coupling constant $g$, we find that the non relativistic constituent quark model prediction $g=1$ is modified, by the inclusion of the relativistic effects due to the light quarks, to the value $g=1/3$, in agreement with recent QCD sum rules determination.