Theory of Classical Gaseous Polytropes in an Integral Representation. I. Some General Results

The well known results of the theory of classical gaseous polytropes are presented in the framework of an integral approach where the standard Lane-Emden differential equation for a spherically symmetric gravitating mass is examined via its equivalent in the form of a nonlinear integral Volterra equation of the 2nd kind. It is shown that the inverse Laplace transform of the Lane-Emden equation for polytropes with an index of n=5 (Schuster model) is a recurrence relation for Bessel functions of the first kind. The invariance of the nonlinear integral Volterra equation with respect to homological transformations is shown, as well as the possibility of obtaining singular solutions under certain conditions. It is also shown that for whole integral and half integral polytrope indices, this equation is equivalent to a multidimensional integral equation, and finding the expansion of the Emden function in a power series of the dimensionless distance ξ from the center of the polytrope is equivalent to finding the Neumann series and the iterated nuclei in the Fredholm theory. Approximations of the Emden functions in closed form and their applicability to various astrophysical objects will be presented and discussed in the second part of this paper. Polytropes of other geometries and dimensionalities are not considered here.