Some remarks on the schemesW d r

Summary Let X be an irreducible smooth projective curve of genus g. Let _d ^r (g) be the Brill-Noether Number. In this paper we prove some results concerning the schemes W _d ^r of special divisors. 1) Suppose dim (W _d–1 ^r )= _{d– 1} ^r (g)0 and _d ^r (g) < g. If W _{d– 1} ^r is a reduced (resp. irreducible) scheme, then W _d ^r is a reduced (resp. irreducible) scheme. 2) Under certain conditions, if Z is a generically reduced irreducible component of W _d–1 ^r then Z W ₁ ⁰ is a generically reduced irreducible component of W _d ^r . For r=1, we obtain some further results in this direction. 3) As an application of it we are able to prove some dimension theorems for the schemes W _d ¹ .