Kepler’s results on extragalactic astrophysics, while less well known than the planetary discoveries are, just as exciting. Early results on active galactic nuclei (AGN) have explored AGN variability on a wide variety of timescales from hours to months. Another program has discovered a number (>4) of likely supernova (SN) candidates, providing, for the first time, constant coverage months before the event, through the rise, and for many months afterwards. Extra-galactic science has benefited from the monitoring of a few hundred galaxies with Kepler, and can be revolutionized with the monitoring of thousands of galaxies. A strawman “Kepler Extragalactic Survey,” or KEGS, would comprise one year of Kepler observations of about 5-20 thousand galaxies and a few hundred normal AGN, with the specific aim of searching for and identifying SNe and low-variability AGN. We propose to monitor bright galaxies (m <19) to search for extra-galactic variability and transients. Given the result from our Kepler GO programs, we expect this study to discover and provide light curves with unprecedented detail of ~20 SNe per K2 campaign. In addition, we would identify ~200 low-variability AGN candidates and study known AGN in the fields chosen. There are no existing or planned facilities that could observe SN explosions as well as Kepler, even in two gyro mode. Every Kepler transient should be promptly detected by our planned ground-based survey, and follow-up resources can be brought to bear. Thus, we will be able to combine the full value of ground-based
surveys: colors, spectra, wide area context, and classification with the exquisite light curves that will be downloaded from Kepler. The combination promises to create a "gold standard", unbiased set of transient sources that can serve many different science projects. The ground-based observing campaign would benefit greatly if K2 would observing the +V direction, if feasible. If you support a K2 supernova search, and would prefer +V observations (if possible), please sign on to this petition to the K2 project.

thank you

Please visit http://www.astro.umd.edu/~olling/KEGS_K2.htm for more information