  In this paper we focus on nonparametric estimators in inverse problems for
Poisson processes involving the use of wavelet decompositions. Adopting an
adaptive wavelet Galerkin discretization, we find that our method combines the
well-known theoretical advantages of wavelet--vaguelette decompositions for
inverse problems in terms of optimally adapting to the unknown smoothness of
the solution, together with the remarkably simple closed-form expressions of
Galerkin inversion methods. Adapting the results of Barron and Sheu [Ann.
Statist. 19 (1991) 1347--1369] to the context of log-intensity functions
approximated by wavelet series with the use of the Kullback--Leibler distance
between two point processes, we also present an asymptotic analysis of
convergence rates that justifies our approach. In order to shed some light on
the theoretical results obtained and to examine the accuracy of our estimates
in finite samples, we illustrate our method by the analysis of some simulated
examples.
