- review stars in the Ursa Major Moving Group and ensure all are accounted for
Astronomy Without a Telescope
- Megrez (stars.astro.illinois.edu)
MEGREZ (Delta Ursae Majoris). The faintest star of the Big Dipper, Megrez is in the Dipper’s middle, linking the handle to the bowl, and in the bigger picture linking Ursa Major’s tail to the Bear’s hindquarters. The name appropriately refers not to the Dipper, but to the Bear, and straightforwardly comes from a long Arabic phrase that means the root of the Great Bear’s tail.
- Delta Ursae Majoris (Wikipedia)
Delta Ursae Majoris (δ Ursae Majoris, abbreviated Delta UMa, δ UMa), formally named Megrez /ˈmiːɡrɛz/, is a star in the northern constellation of Ursa Major. With an apparent magnitude of +3.3, it is the dimmest of the seven stars in the Big Dipper asterism. Parallax measurements yield a distance estimate of 80.5 light-years (24.7 parsecs) from the Sun.
