The coefficient c_A required for O(a) improvement of the axial current in lattice QCD with N_f=3 flavors of Wilson fermions and the tree-level Symanzik-improved gauge action is determined non-perturbatively. The standard improvement condition using S
chroedinger functional boundary conditions is employed at constant physics for a range of couplings relevant for simulations at lattice spacings of ~ 0.09 fm and below. We define the improvement condition projected onto the zero topological charge sector of the theory, in order to avoid the problem of possibly insufficient tunneling between topological sectors in our simulations at the smallest bare coupling. An interpolation formula for c_A(g_0^2) is provided together with our final results.
We improve a previous quenched result for heavy-light pseudoscalar meson decay constants with the light quark taken to be the strange quark. A finer lattice resolution (a ~ 0.05 fm) in the continuum limit extrapolation of the data computed in the sta
tic approximation is included. We also give further details concerning the techniques used in order to keep the statistical and systematic errors at large lattice sizes L/a under control. Our final result, obtained by combining these data with determinations of the decay constant for pseudoscalar mesons around the D_s, follows nicely the qualitative expectation of the 1/m-expansion with a (relative) 1/m-term of about -0.5 GeV/m_PS. At the physical b-quark mass we obtain F_{B_s} = 193(7) MeV, where all errors apart from the quenched approximation are included.
