Delta Ursae Majoris
Encyclopedia
Delta Ursae Majoris is a star
Star
A star is a massive, luminous sphere of plasma held together by gravity. At the end of its lifetime, a star can also contain a proportion of degenerate matter. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun, which is the source of most of the energy on Earth...

 in the constellation
Constellation
In modern astronomy, a constellation is an internationally defined area of the celestial sphere. These areas are grouped around asterisms, patterns formed by prominent stars within apparent proximity to one another on Earth's night sky....

 Ursa Major
Ursa Major
Ursa Major , also known as the Great Bear, is a constellation visible throughout the year in most of the northern hemisphere. It can best be seen in April...

. It has the traditional names Megrez (ˈmɛɡrɛz), from the al-maghriz "the base [of the bear's tail]", and Kaffa.

Megrez has an apparent magnitude
Apparent magnitude
The apparent magnitude of a celestial body is a measure of its brightness as seen by an observer on Earth, adjusted to the value it would have in the absence of the atmosphere...

 of +3.32 making it the dimmest of the seven stars in the Big Dipper
Big Dipper
The Plough, also known as the Big Dipper or the Saptarishi , is an asterism of seven stars that has been recognized as a distinct grouping in many cultures from time immemorial...

. Located 81 light years
Light Years
Light Years is the seventh studio album by Australian recording artist Kylie Minogue. It was released on 25 September 2000 by Parlophone and Mushroom Records. The album's style was indicative of her return to "mainstream pop dance tunes"....

 away, it is of spectral type
Stellar classification
In astronomy, stellar classification is a classification of stars based on their spectral characteristics. The spectral class of a star is a designated class of a star describing the ionization of its chromosphere, what atomic excitations are most prominent in the light, giving an objective measure...

 A3V and thus a bluish-white main sequence
Main sequence
The main sequence is a continuous and distinctive band of stars that appears on plots of stellar color versus brightness. These color-magnitude plots are known as Hertzsprung–Russell diagrams after their co-developers, Ejnar Hertzsprung and Henry Norris Russell...

 star. It has two faint companions, the 11th magnitude Delta Ursae Majoris B, 190 arcseconds away, and the 10th magnitude Delta Ursae Majoris C, 186 arcseconds away.

It is part of the Ursa Major moving group
Ursa Major Moving Group
The Ursa Major Moving Group, also known as Collinder 285 or Ursa Major association, is a nearby stellar moving group, a set of stars with common velocities in space and thought to have a common origin. Its core is located roughly 80 light years away...

.

Namesakes

USS Megrez (AK-126)
USS Megrez (AK-126)
USS Megrez was an commissioned by the U.S. Navy for service in World War II, named after Megrez, the star in constellation Ursa Major...

 was a United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

 Crater class cargo ship
Crater class cargo ship
Crater-class cargo ship is a category of freighter that was constructed for use by the United States Navy during World War II under Maritime Commission EC2-S-C1 type....

named after the star.
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