Many results presented in the book were also obtained during my longer research stays abroad, in particular at the Department of Mathematics, Reading University, U. K. (1993) and at the Mathematical Institute of Er­ langen University, Germany (1996-1997, 2000 and 2003). Both the research activity and the work on the book was supported by a few international projects I participated in. I would like to acknowledge the support of European Community that supported my research stay in Reading University (Grant COST, Noncommutative Measure Theory and von Neumann Algebras, 1993). I am also very much grateful to the Alexan­ der von Humboldt Foundation, Bonn, for long-term support of my research and for awarding me the grants that enabled me work at Erlangen Uni­ versity in 1996-1997, 2000 and 2003.