Discovery and analyses of supernovae

[christinahedges]

Amongst many science opportunities, supernovae offer the opportunity to investigate stellar composition and understand mechanisms that drive the evolution of the galaxy. However, supernovae are best understood by observing and modeling the initial few hours and days of the event. This is often difficult to obtain, as supernovae are usually only discovered several days after the explosion. The Kepler and K2 data sets are thought to contain approximately 60 supernovae and supernova-like transients (e.g. Narayan et al. 2018; Rest et al. 2018b; Smith et al. 2018). In some cases Kepler has captured a full lightcurve starting from before the explosion to many weeks thereafter (e.g. Garnavich et al. 2016). Careful analyses of such data may reveal new insights into the progenitors and the early stages of supernova explosions. For example, a recent event detected by K2 was revealed to be an unusual fast-evolving luminous transient (Rest et al. 2018a).