The VMC survey
  The VISTA survey of the Magellanic Clouds system (VMC) is a public survey
project of the European Southern Observatory. It is collecting multi-band
near-infrared data across large areas of the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds,
the Magellanic Bridge and a few fields in the Magellanic Stream. The
combination of great sensitivity to stars below the old main sequence turn off,
and the multiplicity at Ks band (at least 12 epochs) make VMC highly suitable
for the determination of the spatially resolved star formation history and
three-dimensional geometry, using variable stars such as Cepheids and RR Lyrae
stars. The VMC observations are progressing well and will be completed in 2018.
The VMC survey has a high legacy value and many science results have already
been published, e.g. the most detailed star formation history map of the Small
Magellanic Cloud, and others are in preparation, e.g. a comprehensive
investigation of classical Cepheids and a study of the proper motion in the
foreground 47 Tuc cluster.
