Mirzam

Intrinsically brilliant at absolute magnitude −3.92, Mirzam is a hot blue-white star of spectral class B that appears far more subdued from Earth, at apparent magnitude 1.98, because of its distance of roughly 493 light-years. It carries the Beta designation of Canis Major, the Great Dog, and the Flamsteed number 2. Its strongly negative colour index of −0.24 is a signature of the high surface temperatures found in early B-type stars. Sharing its constellation with the far brighter Sirius, Mirzam is nonetheless a luminous body in its own right, its apparent modesty owed entirely to the great gulf separating it from the Solar System.