Kepler-K2: A Search for Very Red Variables

As a monitoring mission the NASA Kepler K2 mission offers the opportunity to search for long period variables, in this case along the ecliptic plane. The usability of K2 for this search is limited since the observing period of an individual target is restricted to about 80 days. However, this time scale allows detecting LPVs and making at least a rough estimate of the period length. Since no ready-to-use light curves were provided during the early phases of the K2 mission, we had to use a reduction algorithm developed by our group based on the experiences from the primary Kepler mission. Our results can now be nicely compared with the K2’ High Level Science Products’ released in June 2016. The first results of our study up to campaign 3 are presented.