Positive definiteness is determined for a wide class of functions relevant in the study of operator means and their norm comparisons. Then, this information is used to obtain an abundance of new sharp (unitarily) norm inequalities comparing various operator means and sometimes other related operators.

"September 2011, volume 213, number 1004 (end of volume)."

"November 2012, volume 220, number 1035 (third of 4 numbers)."

"Volume 212, number 999 (end of volume)."

The theory of $L$-indistinguishability for inner forms of $SL_2$ has been established in the well-known paper of Labesse and Langlands (L-indistinguishability forSL$(2)$. Canad. J. Math. 31 (1979), no. 4, 726-785). In this memoir, the authors study $L$-indistinguishability for inner forms of $SL_n$ for general $n$. Following the idea of Vogan in (The local Langlands conjecture. Representation theory of groups and algebras, 305-379, Contemp. Math. 145 (1993)), they modify the $S$-group and show that such an $S$-group fits well in the theory of endoscopy for inner forms of $SL_n$.

In the framework of algebraic supergeometry, the authors give a construction of the scheme-theoretic supergeometric analogue of split reductive algebraic group-schemes, namely affine algebraic supergroups associated to simple Lie superalgebras of classical type. In particular, all Lie superalgebras of both basic and strange types are considered. This provides a unified approach to most of the algebraic supergroups considered so far in the literature, and an effective method to construct new ones. The authors' method follows the pattern of a suitable scheme-theoretic revisitation of Chevalley's construction of semisimple algebraic groups, adapted to the reductive case. As an intermediate step, they prove an existence theorem for Chevalley bases of simple classical Lie superalgebras and a PBW-like theorem for their associated Kostant superalgebras.