The Magellanic Quasars Survey. III. Spectroscopic Confirmation of 758
  AGNs Behind the Magellanic Clouds
  The Magellanic Quasars Survey (MQS) has now increased the number of quasars
known behind the Magellanic Clouds by almost an order of magnitude. All survey
fields in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and 70% of those in the Small
Magellanic Cloud (SMC) have been observed. The targets were selected from the
third phase of the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE-III) based on
their optical variability, mid-IR and/or X-ray properties. We spectroscopically
confirmed 758 (565 LMC and 193 SMC) quasars behind the Clouds, of which 94%
(527 LMC and 186 SMC) are newly identified. The MQS quasars have long-term (12
years and growing for OGLE), high-cadence light curves, enabling unprecedented
variability studies of quasars. The MQS quasars also provide a dense reference
grid for measuring both the internal and bulk proper motions of the Clouds, and
50 quasars are bright enough (I<18 mag) for absorption studies of the
interstellar/galactic (ISM/IGM) medium of the Clouds.
