THE SPATIAL-DISTRIBUTION OF THE LMC FOREGROUND STARS

Reddenings and distances of 1883 LMC foreground stars were recently de rived by Oestreicher et al. (1994), taking into account metallicity ef fects. This large data sample allowed not only to derive a reddening m ap of high angular resolution, but also to calculate the distance dist ribution of the stars. With a scale height of (105 +/- 1) pc the early type stars are located in the galactic disc. A component of stars sit uated above the disc with a scale height of (417 +/- 57) pc is visible , too. So the first component belongs to old population I, the second to disc population I. The F stars of solar metallicity are also concen trated to the galactic plane, their scale height is (95 +/- 3) pc. Whe n going to metal-poor stars, the scale height increases rapidly to (24 9 +/- 18) pc and (507 +/- 161) pc for mean metallicities of -0.6 dex a nd -1.2 dex, respectively. Thus these stars belong to disc population I or to intermediate population II. The scale height of the late type giants increases with decreasing metallicity, too. Values of (254 +/- 12) pc, (387 +/- 82) pc and (526 +/- 219) pc for mean metallicities of 0.0 dex, -0.5 dex and -1.1 dex, respectively, imply, that these stars also belong to disc population I or to intermediate population II.