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C. W. Danforth, C. G. Hoopes, R. Sankrit (JHU), Y.-H. Chu (UIUC), K. R. Sembach (STScI), W. P. Blair (JHU)
The supernova remnant SNR\,0057-7226 and the dense, young cluster NGC\,346 lie within the giant \ion{H}{2} region N66, the most active star formation site in the SMC. Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) observations of the Wolf-Rayet binary system HD\,5980, which lies behind the SNR, show high velocity, \ion{O}{6} and \ion{C}{3} absorption associated with the far side of the remnant (Hoopes et~al 2001, ApJ, 558, L35). Chandra ACIS-I and ROSAT HRI images of N66 show the diffuse X-ray emission associated with the SNR, but little or no diffuse emission around the core of the central cluster.
We present high-dispersion, long-slit optical echelle observations of five positions within N66 including positions across the SNR\,0057-7226 and NGC\,346. These data show bright H\alpha emission at the SMC rest velocity (v~155 km s-1). Where the spectrograph slits intersect the SNR, faint H\alpha emission at high (v~300 km s-1) and low (v~50 km s-1) velocities reveals clumps of material on the back and front sides of the SNR shell. Ten FUSE observations of sight lines toward stars in N66--including four toward NGC\,346 cluster stars--provide sensitive absorption-line measurements of several ionic species including \ion{O}{6} which traces hot (T~\times105 K), highly-ionized gas and \ion{Fe}{2} which traces cooler (T~04 K), ionized and neutral gas. We also present ground based optical narrowband images in H\alpha, [\ion{S}{2}], and [\ion{O}{3}] which show the morphology of the \ion{H}{2} region. We use this data set to study the kinematics of the gas in this complex region and to model the properties of the SNR-ISM interaction.
This work is supported by NASA Contract NAS5-32985 to the Johns Hopkins University.
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The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: danforth@pha.jhu.edu