The area of data analysis has been greatly affected by our computer age. For example, the issue of collecting and storing huge data sets has become quite simplified and has greatly affected such areas as finance and telecommunications. Even non-specialists try to analyze data sets and ask basic questions about their structure. One such question is whether one observes some type of invariance with respect to scale, a question that is closely related to the existence of long-range dependence in the data. This important topic of long-range dependence is the focus of this unique work, written by a number of specialists on the subject.

The topics selected should give a good overview from the probabilistic and statistical perspective. Included will be articles on fractional Brownian motion, models, inequalities and limit theorems, periodic long-range dependence, parametric, semiparametric, and non-parametric estimation, long-memory stochastic volatility models, robust estimation, and prediction for long-range dependence sequences. For those graduate students and researchers who want to use the methodology and need to know the "tricks of the trade," there will be a special section called "Mathematical Techniques."

Topics in the first part of the book are covered from probabilistic and statistical perspectives and include fractional Brownian motion, models, inequalities and limit theorems, periodic long-range dependence, parametric, semiparametric, and non-parametric estimation, long-memory stochastic volatility models, robust estimation, prediction for long-range dependence sequences. The reader is referred to more detailed proofs if already found in the literature.

The last part of the book is devoted to applications in the areas of simulation, estimation and wavelet techniques, traffic in computer networks, econometry and finance, multifractal models, and hydrology. Diagrams and illustrations enhance the presentation. Each article begins with introductory background material and is accessible to mathematicians, a variety of practitioners, and graduate students. The work serves as a state-of-the art reference or graduate seminar text.

Despite its short history, wavelet theory has found applications in a remarkable diversity of disciplines: mathematics, physics, numerical analysis, signal processing, probability theory and statistics. The abundance of intriguing and useful features enjoyed by wavelet and wavelet packed transforms has led to their application to a wide range of statistical and signal processing problems. On November 16-18, 1994, a conference on Wavelets and Statistics was held at Villard de Lans, France, organized by the Institute IMAG-LMC, Grenoble, France. The meeting was the 15th in the series of the Rencontres Pranco-Belges des 8tatisticiens and was attended by 74 mathematicians from 12 different countries. Following tradition, both theoretical statistical results and practical contributions of this active field of statistical research were presented. The editors and the local organizers hope that this volume reflects the broad spectrum of the conference. as it includes 21 articles contributed by specialists in various areas in this field. The material compiled is fairly wide in scope and ranges from the development of new tools for non parametric curve estimation to applied problems, such as detection of transients in signal processing and image segmentation. The articles are arranged in alphabetical order by author rather than subject matter. However, to help the reader, a subjective classification of the articles is provided at the end of the book. Several articles of this volume are directly or indirectly concerned with several as pects of wavelet-based function estimation and signal denoising."