Null space distributions—A new approach to finite convolution equations with a Hankel kernel

In some earlier publications it has been shown that the solutions of the boundary integral equations for some mixed boundary value problems for the Helmholtz equation permit integral representations in terms of solutions of associated complicated singular algebraic ordinary differential equations. The solutions of these differential equations, however, are required to be known on some infinite interval on the real line, which is unsatisfactory from a practical point of view. In this paper, for the example of one specific boundary integral equation, the relevant solutions of the associated differential equation are expressed by integrals which contain only one unknown generalized function, the support of this generalized function is no longer unbounded but a compact subset of the real line. This generalized function is a distributional solution of the homogeneous boundary integral equation. By this null space distribution the boundary integral equation can be solved for arbitrary right-hand sides, this solution method can be considered of being analogous to the method of variation of parameters in the theory of ordinary differential equations. The nature of the singularities of the null space distribution is worked out and it is shown that the null space distribution itself can be expressed by solutions of the associated ordinary differential equation.