5 Summary

As part of an ISO Guaranteed Time Program on H II regions in Local Group Galaxies a sample of Magellanic Cloud H II regions has been observed with the spectrometers onboard ISO. Complementary to the infrared data is a large set of optical spectra. Aim of the project is to give a new and improved analysis of the physical structure of the sample H II regions by combining as much spectral data as possible.

In this first of a set of papers, the sample objects and the data set are presented. An account is given of the reduction of the data and a discussion about the reliability of the line fluxes is presented. In this discussion, attention has been paid to problems regarding extinction and to problems generated by the SWS/LWS instruments themselves. The analysis based on this data set will be given in different papers. The results on the large-scale temperature stratification, the elemental abundances and the ionization structure of the sample H II regions will be presented in Vermeij & Van der Hulst (2002). The analysis of the photodissociation regions based on the LWS lines will be given in Damour et al. (in prep.).

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the referee for his constructive criticism and comments which helped to improve the paper. The ISO Spectral Analysis Package (ISAP) is a joint development by the LWS and SWS Instrument Teams and Data Centers. Contributing institutes are CESR, IAS, IPAC, MPE, RAL and SRON. IA³ is a joint development of the SWS consortium. Contributing institutes are SRON, MPE, KUL and the ESA Astrophysics Division. LIA is a joint development of the LWS consortium. Contributing institutes are DRAL, CESR and the ESA Astrophysics Division.