Deconvolution problems arise in a variety of situations in statistics. An interesting problem is to estimate the density f of a random variable X based on n i.i.d. observations from Y = X + , where is a measurement error with a known distribution. In this paper, the effect of errors in variables of nonparametric deconvolution is examined. Insights are gained by showing that the difficulty of deconvolution depends on the smoothness of error distributions: the smoother, the harder. In fact, there are two types of optimal rates of convergence according to whether the error distribution is ordinary smooth or supersmooth. It is shown that optimal rates of convergence can be achieved by deconvolution kernel density estimators.

In this paper we introduce a smooth version of local linear regression estimators and address their advantages. The MSE and MISE of the estimators are computed explicitly. It turns out that the local linear regression smoothers have nice sampling properties and high minimax efficiency-they are not only efficient in rates but also nearly efficient in constant factors. In the nonparametric regression context, the asymptotic minimax lower bound is developed via the heuristic of the" hardest onedimensional subproblem" of Donoho and Liu. Connections of the minimax risk with the modulus of continuity are made. The lower bound is also applicable for estimating conditional mean (regression) and conditional quantiles for both fixed and random design regression problems.

A decorated surface S is an oriented surface, with or without boundary, and a finite set {s 1,..., s n} of special points on the boundary, considered modulo isotopy. Let G be a split reductive group over [special characters omitted].

We define Stasheff polytopes in the spaces of tropical points of cluster A -varieties. We study the supports of products of elements of canonical bases for cluster A -varieties. We prove that, for the cluster A -variety of type A , such supports are Stasheff polytopes.

Let G be a connected almost simple algebraic group with a Dynkin automorphism . Let G be the connected almost simple algebraic group associated with G and . We prove that the dimension of the tensor invariant space of G is equal to the trace of on the corresponding tensor invariant space of G. We prove that if G has the saturation property then so does G . As a consequence, we show that the spin group Spin (2 n+ 1) has saturation factor 2, which strengthens the results of BelkaleKumar [1] and Sam [28] in the case of type B n.