Mean ergodic composition operators on spaces of smooth functions and distributions

Abstract: We investigate (uniform) mean ergodicity of weighted composition operators on the space of smooth functions and the space of distributions, both over an open subset of the real line. Among other things, we prove that a composition operator with a real analytic diffeomorphic symbol is mean ergodic on the space of distributions if and only if it is periodic with period 2. Our results are based on a characterization of mean ergodicity in terms of Ces`aro boundedness and a growth property of the orbits for operators on Montel spaces which is of independent interest.