New Riccati equations for radiating matter

The relationship between radiating stars in general relativity and Riccati equations is investigated for a general matter distribution including the electromagnetic field and the cosmological constant. A generalised transformation relating the gravitational potentials for a spherically symmetric relativistic gravitating fluid is introduced. This generates a new Riccati equation at the surface of the radiating star. Exact solutions to the boundary condition are found and the gravitational potentials are given explicitly. Some of the consistency conditions can be reduced to Bernoulli equations which admit exact solutions. We also demonstrate that the reduction of order allows us to write the boundary condition as a first order equation utilising the generalised transformation. Solutions obtained using the generalised transformation also admit a linear equation of state.