Past exam of the distribution theory course of the University of Oxford / 2023 / 3 / a / iv

Let $u,v\in {\mathcal{D}}^{\prime }({\mathbb{R}}^n)$, with at least one a compactly supported distribution, so their convolution is defined. The support and singular support rules for convolution areHere $A+B=\{a+b:a\in A,b\in B\}$ is the Minkowski sum. The compact-factor hypothesis also ensures that these sums of closed sets are closed. More generally, the same rules hold when addition is a proper map on $\mathrm{supp}u\times \mathrm{supp}v$, which is another sufficient condition for defining the convolution. The second inclusion explains why a compactly supported smooth function smooths every distribution under convolution.