Vega is the brightest star in the triangle and is almost directly overhead in the summer. Contrary to what you might have seen in the movie Contact, no signs of an extraterrestrial civilization have been detected around this hot star—at least not yet.

The name Vega comes from the Arabic word meaning swooping eagle or vulture. Vega is the luminary of Lyra, the Harp, a small but prominent constellation that is home to the Ring Nebula and the star Epsilon Lyrae. In mythology, Orpheus led Eurydice back from the underworld by charming the guards of the underworld with the music of his harp.

The Ring Nebula is a luminous shell of gas that was ejected from an old star. It resembles a smoke ring or doughnut. Epsilon Lyrae appears to the naked eye as a double star, but through a small telescope you can see that the two individual stars are themselves double! Epsilon Lyrae is popularly known as the "double double."

Vega is a hydrogen-burning dwarf star, 54 times as luminous and 1.5 times as massive as the sun. It's relatively close to us, 25 light-years away.