The spectral analysis of three families of exceptional Laguerre polynomials

The Bochner Classification Theorem (1929) characterizes the polynomial sequences { p n } n = 0 ∞ , with deg p n = n that simultaneously form a complete set of eigenstates for a second-order differential operator and are orthogonal with respect to a positive Borel measure having finite moments of all orders. Indeed, up to a complex linear change of variable, only the classical Hermite, Laguerre, and Jacobi polynomials, with certain restrictions on the polynomial parameters, satisfy these conditions. In 2009, Gomez-Ullate, Kamran, and Milson found that for sequences { p n } n = 1 ∞ , deg p n = n (without the constant polynomial), the only such sequences satisfying these conditions are the exceptional X 1 -Laguerre and X 1 -Jacobi polynomials. Subsequently, during the past five years, several mathematicians and physicists have discovered and studied other exceptional orthogonal polynomials { p n } n ? N 0 ? A , where A is a finite subset of the non-negative integers N 0 and where deg p n = n for all n ? N 0 ? A . We call such a sequence an exceptional polynomial sequence of codimension | A | , where the latter denotes the cardinality of A . All exceptional sequences with a non singular weight, found to date, have the remarkable feature that they form a complete orthogonal set in their natural Hilbert space setting.Among the exceptional sets already known are two types of exceptional Laguerre polynomials, called the Type I and Type II exceptional Laguerre polynomials, each omitting m polynomials. In this paper, we briefly discuss these polynomials and construct the self-adjoint operators generated by their corresponding second-order differential expressions in the appropriate Hilbert spaces. In addition, we present a novel derivation of the Type III family of exceptional Laguerre polynomials along with a detailed disquisition of its properties. We include several representations of these polynomials, orthogonality, norms, completeness, the location of their local extrema and roots, root asymptotics, as well as a complete spectral study of the second-order Type III exceptional Laguerre differential expression.