Sirius

STARS by Jim Kaler

Sirius (stars.astro.illinois.edu) SIRIUS (Alpha Canis Majoris). From Orion, look south and to the east to find brilliant Sirius, as if one really needs directions to find the brightest star in the sky.

binary star

Sirius is a binary star system consisting of two white stars orbiting each other with a separation of about 20 AU (roughly the distance between the Sun and Uranus) and a period of 50.1 years.

charts

NGC 2506 - Open Cluster (freestarcharts.com)

classification

Sirius A is classed as a type Am star, because the spectrum shows deep metallic absorption lines, indicating an enhancement of its surface layers in elements heavier than helium, such as iron.

distance

The Hipparcos parallax for Sirius is only accurate to about ±0.04 light years, giving a distance of 8.6 light years. Sirius B is generally assumed to be at the same distance.

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random

The devil loosely drawn

star of

Canis Major

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Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius
Sirius (Wikipedia) Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Greek word Σείριος (Latin script: Seirios), meaning lit. ‘glowing’ or ‘scorching’. The star is designated α Canis Majoris, Latinized to Alpha Canis Majoris, and abbreviated α CMa or Alpha CMa. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, Sirius is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. Sirius is a binary star consisting of a main-sequence star of spectral type A0 or A1, termed Sirius A, and a faint white dwarf companion of spectral type DA2, termed Sirius B. The distance between the two varies between 8.2 and 31.5 astronomical units as they orbit every 50 years.