What type of astronomer studies supernovas?

Answer 1

By looking for them. Either by telescope or sometimes, with the naked eye. They are one of the most luminous objects in the sky emitting as much energy as our Sun does in it's entire lifetime.

Answer 2

Supernova are rare events within a galaxy, occurring about once every 50 years in the Milky Way. Therefore obtaining a good sample of supernova requires regular monitoring of many galaxies. Normally, when supernova are discovered, they are already in progress. Scientific interest is using supernovae as standard candles for measuring distance. Amateur astronomers, play an important role in finding supernovae, by looking at some of the closer galaxies through a telescope and comparing them to earlier photographs. Towards the end of the 20th century, astronomers increasingly turned to computer-controlled telescopes and CCDs for hunting supernovae. While such systems are popular with amateurs, there are also larger installations like the Katzman Automatic Imaging Telescope. Recently, the Supernova Early Warning System (SNEWS) project has also begun using a network of neutrino detectors to give early warning of a supernova in the Milky Way galaxy. Supernova searches fall into two classes: those focused on relatively nearby events and those looking for explosions farther away. Because of the expansion of the universe, the distance to a remote object with a known emission spectrum can be estimated by measuring its Doppler shift (or redshift); on average, more distant objects recede with greater velocity than those nearby, and so have a higher redshift. High redshift searches for supernovae usually involve the observation of supernova light curves. These are useful for standard or calibrated candles to generate Hubble diagrams and make cosmological predictions. At low redshift, supernova spectroscopy is more practical than at high redshift, and this is used to study the physics and environments of supernovae. Low redshift observations also anchor the low distance end of the Hubble curve, which is a plot of distance versus redshift for visible galaxies. See link for more information

Answer 3

Though I am not 100 percent positive, I am 99 percent certain that Supernovas would be included in the studies done by an ASTROPHYSICIST.