Canopus

Canopus, also known as Alpha Carinae, was an inhabited planetary system in the Beta Quadrant. The official name for the system's star was Canopus. The system had several planets with some of them being Class M worlds. One of these worlds, Alpha Carinae II, was home to a pre-warp civilization. Notable lifeforms found in this system included a species of dinosaur on Canopus III and the drella of Alpha Carinae V.
In 2267, helmsman Hikaru Sulu used Canopus as a reference point to plot the location of the Enterprise after it was flung five hundred parsecs by the Metrons. (; ; ) 
== Stellar cartography ==
The Canopus system was visible from Earth in the constellation Carina. This system was approximately 310 light years from Sol. 
In 2257, the location of this system was labeled on the star chart showing the trajectory of Lieutenant Spocks shuttle. ()
In 2293, Alpha Carinae's location in the Milky Way Galaxy was labeled in the star chart "The Explored Galaxy", which was on display in Captain James T. Kirk's quarters aboard the . ( okudagram)
Later that year, the location of this system was labeled in a star chart found on the navigation console of the . ()
In 2365, the location of Alpha Carinae was labeled in a Subspace Comm Net Ops star chart, which was seen in the courtroom on Starbase 173. Subspace lines connected this system to Alfa 177 and an unnamed location. ()
In 2366, in an alternate timeline, during the , the location of Alpha Carinae was labeled on a tactical situation monitor on the bridge and in the ready room of the . ( okudagram)
In 2367, the location of Alpha Carinae was labeled on a tactical situation monitor in Captain Benjamin Maxwell's ready room on the . ( okudagram) 
== Appendices ==
=== Background information ===
Information on this system was derived from the episodes and films, the reference works Star Trek: Star Charts and Stellar Cartography: The Starfleet Reference Library, and real-world sources. The reference works were used extensively in the creation of star charts seen in , , , , and . The real-world information added to the article was current as of 2025.
Star charts seen in , , and located Alpha Carinae (Canopus) in the Alpha Quadrant. This was retconned for and , which have star charts locating Alpha Carinae (Canopus) in the Beta Quadrant. 
Canopus and Alpha Carinae were depicted as being two separate stars on a star chart first seen in and subsequently reused in a number of Star Trek episodes. In reality, these are two different names for the same star. This contradiction is also noted in the . A map seen in the episode correctly gave both names for the same celestial object.
The described Canopus, the system's primary, as a red supergiant star and said it was used as a navigational reference by Voyager series probes and other NASA spacecraft.
For , Alex Jaeger created a ship size comparison chart for Industrial Light & Magic. On this chart, one of the names considered for the starship was the USS Canopus. 
In August 2024, an annotated computer paste-up of the star chart from "The Measure Of A Man" was put up for auction in the Entertainment Memorabiliia Live Auction: Los Angeles Summer 2024 by Propstore Auction. This chart was made before the canonical association between Alpha Carinae and Canopus was established, so that there two locations for this system shown on the chart. }}
=== External links ===
* 
* 
* 
de:Canopus
es:Canopus
fr:Canopus
ja:カノープス
nl:Canopus
Category:Star systems