Dust in the Small Magellanic Cloud: Interstellar Polarization and Extinction

The typical extinction curve for the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), in contrast to that for the Galaxy, has no bump at 2175 Å and has a steeper rise into the far ultraviolet. For the Galaxy the interpretation of the extinction and, therefore, the dust content of the interstellar medium has been greatly assisted by measurements of the wavelength dependence of the polarization. To the present no such measurements existed for the SMC. Therefore, to further elucidate the dust properties in the SMC we have for the first time measured linear polarization in five colors in the optical region of the spectrum Now at Inst. Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais-INPE, Divisão de Astrof́ısica-DAS, Caixa Postal 515, São José dos Campos SP 12201-970, Brazil Guest observer at IUE Visiting Astronomer, Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory. CTIO is operated by AURA, Inc. under contract to the National Science Foundation Visiting Astronomer, Complejo Astronomico El Leoncito, San Juan, Argentina Visiting Astronomer, European Southern Observatory, La Silla, Chile