Locator: 48667FIRE.
California wildfires:
- first six months, 2025: 3,290 fires; 96,994 acres across all of California; does not include the Madre fire which broke out in July
- currently, Madre fire, first full day: 52,000 acres; 5% contained
- full year, 2024: 8,024 fires; 1,050,012 acres; slightly less than five-year average, but still significant
- full year, 2021: 7,396 fires; 2,569,386 acres
- full year, 2020, the worst year in modern history for wildfires: around 10,000 fires; 4.2 to 4.3 million acres;
- the August Complex fire was the largest single fire in California history, burning over a million acres. Historical Context: CalMatters notes that 2020 was on a scale not seen in at least 100 years.
- full year, 2018: 8,527 fires; 1,975,086 acres; largest on record at the time, but now third, after 2020 and 2021; not the worst year in terms of number of acres burned, but the 2018 fire season is considered the deadliest and most destructive due to the Camp Fire in Paradise, which resulted in 86 deaths and 18,804 structures destroyed
Hamas: signs cease-fire; temporary.
SRP: add this book to my summer reading program, Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body, Neil Shubin, c. 2008, 2009. See below.
Barnes and Noble: Lego store masquerading as a bookstore, at least here in north Texas.
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ZPAs
The short version: The Zone of Polarizing Activity (ZPA) is a critical signaling center in developing vertebrate limbs, specifically during the formation of the anterior-posterior (thumb to little finger) axis. It's a group of cells located in the posterior mesenchyme of the limb bud that plays a key role in limb development by directing the formation of digits. The ZPA achieves this by producing a signaling molecule called Sonic hedgehog (Shh), which creates a concentration gradient across the limb bud.
