Raytheon employees in Tucson will lead the way on work for the United States Navy’s Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile system after a $13.7 million contract modification was awarded to the company on Wednesday.

More than 90 percent of the work will be done in Tucson, according to a press release announcing the decision. Work will also occur in the Netherlands, Norway, Germany, and Australia, in addition to sites in West Virginia, Canada, Spain, and Turkey.

The missile program is described as an international cooperative effort and is a medium-range surface-to-air system designed to protect ships from missiles and attacking aircraft. Development of the Sea Sparrow program began with NATO in 1990, and Raytheon delivered the first production system to the Navy. The missile entered into service in 2004.

Work on the current project is expected to wrap up in December and the contract includes purchases for the Navy and the governments of Thailand, Japan, and the United Arab Emirates.

Raytheon was originally awarded the contract in 2016 at a potential value of $197 million.

With libraries and schools closed there are families across Pima County without reliable access to free or low-cost books, but adventures are available in the palm of your hand thanks to Make Way for Books’ smartphone app.

The literacy nonprofit works with families with young children ages 0 to 5 in order to empower them with the skills and confidence they need to be their child’s most important teacher, according to Fernando González, the Digital Director of Make Way for Books.

Too often, children enter kindergarten lacking important early literacy skills. Make Way for Books goes out into the community to provide programming so families can access high-quality literacy aid.

Normally, their work consists of a couple of strategies, including the Family Education and Literacy, The Story Project and Neighborhood School Readiness Project programs, which provide literacy aid both in and out of the home. The Story Project, for instance, includes at-home education, on-site workshops, and lending libraries.

According to González, Make Way for Books tries to provide a two-generational approach in which parents are there with their kids providing a reading lesson while also learning explicit strategies on how to share books with their children.

While the cancelation of events and changes to schedules here in Tucson are relatively new, closures are happening everywhere all over the world and have been for months now. Because of this, people are having to identify alternative means of gathering in groups for activities.

Although online avatars have been a thing for some time now through video games and other casual online forums, businesses have been trying to break into the online space for a few years for professional reasons. And, sure, live-streaming your event (a la SXSW) is also a great alternative, but it's definitely not as engaging or interactive.

Now, there's an even greater purpose than just creating your inner self into an online world. With the rise of social distancing comes the rise of the online avatar. For the most part, we don't even need newly created software. Everything we need is already available to use.

Japan, like other Asian nations, has been dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic for some time now. Schools have been closed, and other ways of learning have been instituted. This hasn't stopped students from enjoying things like graduation.

In the below tweet you can see students using online avatars in Minecraft to hold a graduation ceremony.


Of course, this isn't the first time that Minecraft has been used for something outside of just being a game. Recently, Reporters Without Borders opened, "The Uncensored Library" in the game so that people from all over the world could share banned news articles from other countries.

VR Chat is another place where people from all walks of life gather in a virtual space. Most of the time it's silly chit chat, but every so often there are more serious talks. YouTuber Syrmor holds interviews with various people inside the game on sometimes difficult topics.


Second Life has been around for a long time but still has a strong group of hardcore users, some of which have experienced shopping, selling, dating, marriage, divorce, pride parades, and more. There's even an American Cancer Society Relay for Life event scheduled in June.

Then there's World of Warcraft. While technically it's not meant to be anything other than a Role Playing Game, because of this it can really be whatever you want it to be. Hardcore role-players have known this for years, and you can find them on many of the roleplaying servers that are provided for play. Others, though, have found different uses.


Of course, not every meeting held in World of Warcraft goes down as expected.


For a more professional take on the online avatar, there's XPlaneVR, who has made its software available for parties interested in hosting large events, classes, or symposiums.

There are other examples all over the internet if you just take a look. You never know which one might be right for you, and what you may use it for in the future. 

If you haven’t heard yet, 2020 events have pretty much all been canceled for the foreseeable future. Whether the response to the spread of COVID-19 is in haste or justified, people are now left wondering, “What is there to do, now?” Well, there’s one option that people have used for decades when they tire of the public, and that’s video games.

Here are just a few video games that you might want to check out if you’re bored at home and have nothing else to do:

‘Harvest Moon’ Series
• This is a great game to settle into if you’ve never really played games before. You play as a farmer that has to rebuild a farm. Its cute graphics will make you forget how hard running a farm or ranch really is while still teaching you life skills like happy cows make golden milk. Plus, none of the yearly festivals are canceled!
  
  
‘The Sims’
• You may not be able to attend parties in real life, but nothing is stopping your Sim! Create your sims to your liking and have them do your bidding. You have ultimate control in this game.
  
  
‘Don’t Starve’
• If you ever wanted to see what it would be like to slowly go mad and starve to death while in an insane world, then this is the game for you. You’ll have to collect everything from sticks and twigs to gold and beard shavings if you want to make it past a night or two. Build machines to tell you the weather, help you fight off visions, or tame pig men.
  
  
‘Fallout’ Series
• If you’re wondering what an extended quarantine might be like, then ‘Fallout’ could be your best bet. Experience the world after a nuclear war. Imagine the possibilities!
  
  
‘Left 4 Dead’
• After humanity falls to a zombie virus that’s in all of us, some carriers are left behind as the only humans left. Fight off the horde to get to a safe place while learning some combat tactics along the way. Don’t alert the witch!
  
  
‘The Last of Us’
• A mutated strain of Cordyceps fungus ravages the US and turns people into walking nightmares reminiscent of zombies. There’s some heavy storyline regarding people who are infected.
  
  
‘Resident Evil’ Series
• After a genetically modified virus has been unleashed, people turn into horrific zombies and other mutated creatures that you must get rid of. Oh, and you have to battle against the evil Umbrella corporation that created the virus in the first place.
  
  
‘Candy Crush’
• It’s a really good time-waster.

Tucson Comic-Con will take place on Friday, Nov. 2 at 3 p.m., Saturday Nov. 3 at 10 a.m. and Sunday Nov. 4. at 10 a.m. at the Tucson Convention Center. The mission is “Pop Culture for All”.

The 11th annual Tucson Comic-Con is presented by Zia Records. It is dedicated to bringing a community-based pop culture experience. They will have TV and movie celebrities, comic book creators, artists, costume groups, photo ops, games, panels, a scavenger hunt and a Kid Zone.

Tucson Comic-Con was founded by Mike Olivares and began as a single-day event with 500 fans. Over the years the event has now grown into the three day festival it is today, complete with all your favorite comic-related activities and over 10,000 attendees each year.

The celebrity guests include Jake “The Snake” Roberts who is known for his work with the World Wrestling Federation, Tim Rose who is most famous for his character Admiral Ackbar in Star Wars, Rachel Lillis who is best known for her work in Pokémon and Kirk R. Thatcher who is an Emmy award winning writer/producer for Dinosaurs, Muppet Treasure Island and numerous Muppet films.

Comic industry guests include Dennis O’Neil, an acclaimed comic book writer and editor, Budd Root, whose first comic book Cavewoman has been continually published for well over 20 years making it one of the longest running independent titles in recent memory, Sina Grace, writer and artist who drew several series, Dan Mendoza, creator of Zombie Tramp in 2009, Dawn Mcteigue, a comic book artist and Eric M. Esquivel, a comic book author.

The annual costume contest will take place at the Tucson Convention Center’s Leo Rich Theater on Saturday, Nov. 4 at 7 p.m. with the youth costume contest a little earlier in the day at 2 p.m.

Apple is notorious for introducing its technological advancements and new products to its users in September. Well, for all of you who have been waiting, it's finally here.

If you're on Twitter, you may have already watched the live event, but for those who didn't, let's catch you up:

Apple Series 4 Apple Watch:

Jeff Williams, Apple's COO, took the stage to release the new series of Apple Watches and said the new product's three core values are connectivity, fitness, and health. The first thing he discussed was the new display, it is now 30 percent larger with an edge-to-edge screen but is now thinner according to Williams. It is made with black ceramic making sound waves and cellular service travel better. The sound is now 50 percent louder and the watch can now detect when you fall. This detections feature gives the user the option to call emergency services if the fall was serious. If there is no response from the user within one minute, emergency services are called automatically.

The heart rate alert that has been on the previous series now has three new features:

The new model has a low heart rate alarm that will notify the user of signs of atrial fibrillation-a condition of having an irregular heartbeat. What's more, there is now an electrocardiogram feature, making it the first ECG feature available over the counter.

The Series 4 Apple Watch with GPS will be available for $399 while the one that includes cellular will be $499. It comes in three colors, space grey, silver and gold. It can be preordered this Friday, Sept. 14 and can be received as early as Friday, Sept. 21.

iPhone Xs and Xs Max:
The event also included the announcements of new iPhone models. The iPhone Xs has a 5.8 inch super retina display with an all screen front display, while the iPhone Xs Max is 6.5 inches, Apple's biggest phone yet. Both phones have an LCD screen and are waterproof in up to two meters of water for 30 minutes. Better yet, it's orange juice, wine, and beer proof.

They now come with the all new A-12 Bionic chip, a neural engine with machine learning, expanding the way users experience photos, gaming and more. The camera, even better than before, has dual lenses at 12MP with an improved portrait mode making it possible to adjust the level of blur in your photos.

The iPhone Xs is said to last 30 minutes longer than the X, while the iPhone Xs Max lasts 90 minutes longer. They will be available in the same three colors as before, silver, space gray and gold. With storage options of 64, 128 and 512 GB. The new additions still do not have a home button and will rely on facial recognition. They include wireless charging but can still be charged with a lightning cable.

The iPhone Xs starts at $999 while the iPhone Xs Max starts at $1,099. They will be available for purchase on Friday, Sept. 14.

iPhone Xr:

With a 6.1 inch display, liquid retina and the most advanced LCD a phone has ever had, Apple made an effort to make sure this new product would not disappoint. The camera is the same as the two other new releases, 12 MP, but only contains one lens. It is only waterproof for 30 minutes up to 1 meter. It will also include facial recognition and wireless charging. It also comes in a wider range of colors which include the following: yellow, white, blue, black, coral and red. The storage options are 64, 128, and 264 GB.

The iPhone Xr starts at $749 and will be available for purchase on Friday, Sept. 14.

A new deception detecting software has been developed by the University of Arizona’s Center for the Management of information. AVATAR, as its been dubbed, stands for Automated Virtual Agent for Truth Assessments in Real-Time.

In essence, the program shows the user an automated interviewer who asks the user a set of questions. The user’s voice, body language and eye movement are analyzed as the interview takes place. These then get sent through a system of complex algorithms that will respond in one of three ways: green means no issues were detected, yellow means there are some issues to be investigated and red means there are serious issues that need to be addressed.

Jay Nunamaker is the director of the Center for the Management of Information at UA and will serve as the CEO for Discern Science International Inc., the company UA licensed to commercialize the program.

The main application for AVATAR is border security. With somewhere between 70 to 92 percent accuracy, the program could enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of border checkpoints.

The Department of Defense, National Science Foundation, FRONTEX and Department of Homeland Security provided funding for the work, with Tech Launch Arizona helping with the transition to commercialization.

Learn more here

The University of Arizona’s online program was ranked third in the state by onlinecolleges.com. Northern Arizona University clinched the top spot with Grand Canyon University at number two.

The website ranks schools based on 11 criteria including graduation rate, tuition, electronic library collections, number of programs and services among others.

Onlinecolleges.com named NAU as the best online college in Arizona because of the large number of programs offered and their Personalized Learning Programs that allow students to complete classes at their own pace.

U A landed at number three because of the broad range of majors that can be completed online such as mining, cybersecurity and pediatric nursing.

Other notable schools include the University of Phoenix, ranked number four, and Arizona State University at number six.

See the full list here.

Nearly two centuries ago, astronomers witnessed the explosive death of one of the brightest star in our galaxy—or so they thought.

Eta Carinae is a stellar system that seemingly went through a supernova in the mid-1800s, yet is still around to tell the tale. But how? Astronomers at UA’s Steward Observatory are making the most of a fascinating phenomenon to look back in the past and figure out the mystery of the star that won’t die.

A “Light Echo” is when light bounces off celestial bodies before reaching Earth, essentially taking longer than it normally would to reach us. This delay allows astronomers to, in a sense, look back in the past at Eta Carinae’s great eruption.

First off, Eta Carinae is a binary star, which means it’s actually two stars in close orbit that can look like a single star to the untrained eye. Using data gathered from light echoes, UA astronomers theorize that the supernova witnessed in 1837 wasn’t the death of a single star, or even of a binary star, but an energy transfer between three stars.

In this proposed scenario, two large stars orbit closely together while a third star orbits in the distance. When the largest of the two binary stars begins to die, it expands and transfers most of its material onto its slightly smaller sibling, thus resulting in the two extant stars post-supernova that we see today.

Extra: About the photo: The Carina Nebula is a large bright nebula that surrounds several clusters of stars. It contains two of the most massive and luminous stars in our Milky Way galaxy, Eta Carinae and HD 93129A. Located 7500 light years away, the nebula itself spans some 260 light years across, about 7 times the size of the Orion Nebula, and is shown in all its glory in this mosaic. It is based on images collected with the 1.5-m Danish telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory. Being brighter than one million Suns, Eta Carinae (the brightest star in this image) is the most luminous star known in the Galaxy, and has most likely a mass over 100 times that of the Sun. It is the closest example of a luminous blue variable, the last phase in the life of a very massive star before it explodes in a fiery supernova. Eta Carinae is surrounded by an expanding bipolar cloud of dust and gas known as the Homunculus ('little man' in Latin), which astronomers believe was expelled from the star during a great outburst seen in 1843.