Correspondence of the eigenvalues of a non-self-adjoint operator to those of a self-adjoint operator

We prove that the eigenvalues of a certain highly non-self-adjoint operator that arises in fluid mechanics correspond, up to scaling by a positive constant, to those of a self-adjoint operator with compact resolvent; hence there are infinitely many real eigenvalues which accumulate only at $\pm \infty$. We use this result to determine the asymptotic distribution of the eigenvalues and to compute some of the eigenvalues numerically. We compare these to earlier calculations by other authors.