A constraint variational problem arising in stellar dynamics

We use the compactness result of A. Burchard and Y. Guo (cf. \cite{BuGu}) to analyze the reduced 'energy' functional arising naturally in the stability analysis of steady states of the Vlasov-Poisson system (cf. \cite{SaSo} and \cite{Ha}). We consider the associated variational problem and present a new proof that puts it in the general framework for tackling the variational problems of this type, given by Y. Guo and G. Rein (cf. \cite{Re1} and \cite{Re2}).