Dr. Michael Shara's research interests include the structure and evolution of novae and supernovae; collisions between stars and the remnant descendants of those collisions; and the populations of stars inhabiting star clusters and galaxies. He frequently observes with the Hubble Space Telescope and other large ground-based telescopes. His research team at the museum is currently surveying our Milky Way galaxy for all of its pre-supernova stars and black hole binaries. He also studies the evolution of nova binary stars over billions of years, and has recently shown that metamorphosis occurs between different types of cataclysmic binary stars.