"Ab initio" models of galaxy formation: successes and open problems
  In the past decades, different approaches have been developed in order to
link the physical properties of galaxies to the dark matter haloes in which
they reside. In this review, I give a brief overview of methods, aims, and
limits of these techniques, with particular emphasis on semi-analytic models of
galaxy formation. For these models, I also provide a brief summary of recent
successes and open problems.
