Tridiagonalization of the hypergeometric operator and the Racah–Wilson algebra

The algebraic underpinning of the tridiagonalization procedure is investigated. The focus is put on the tridiagonalization of the hypergeometric operator and its associated quadratic Jacobi algebra. It is shown that under tridiagonalization, the quadratic Jacobi algebra becomes the quadratic Racah-Wilson algebra associated to the generic Racah/Wilson polynomials. A degenerate case leading to the Hahn algebra is also discussed.