Elliptic finite-band potentials of a non-self-adjoint Dirac operator

We present an explicit two-parameter family of finite-band Jacobi elliptic potentials for a non-self-adjoint Dirac operator which connects two previously known limiting cases in which the elliptic parameter is zero or one. A full characterization of the spectrum is obtained by relating the periodic and antiperiodic eigenvalue problems for the Dirac operator to corresponding eigenvalue problems for tridiagonal operators acting on Fourier coefficients in a weighted Hilbert space and to appropriate connection problems for Heun's equation. In turn, these problems are related to four non-self-adjoint unbounded tridiagonal operators, all of which nonetheless have only real eigenvalues. For certain parameter values, the corresponding elliptic potentials generate finite-genus solutions for all the positive and negative flows of the focusing nonlinear Schr\"odinger hierarchy.