We obtain lower bounds on the number of scattering poles for a class o
f abstract compactly supported perturbations of the Laplacian in R(n),
n odd. They are applied to estimate the number of resonances for obst
acle scattering and for hypoelliptic compactly supported perturbations
of the Laplacian. The proof involves a development of Lax-Phillips th
eory in a generalized setting, a Poisson formula for scattering poles,
and some simple Tauberian arguments. (C) 1994 Academic Press, Inc.