THE HI MOSAIC OF THE LARGE MAGELLANIC CLOUD

We present the recent results of an HI aperture synthesis mosaic of the Large Magellanic Cloud(LMC), made by combining data from 1344 separate pointing centers using the Australia Telescope Compact Array(ATCA). The resolution of the mosaiced images is 1'.0 (15 pc, using a distance to the LMC of 50 kpc). In contrast with its appearance at other wavelengths, the LMC is remarkably symmetric in HI on the largest scales, with the bulk of the HI residing in a disk of diameter 7.3 kpc. Outer spiral structure is clearly seen, though the features appear due to differential rotation, therefore transient in nature. A good correlation is seen between the supershells previously identified in Halpha (e.g. Meaburn 1980) and HI structures.