The Desert Studies Center is a field station of the California State University located in Zzyzx, California, United States in the Mojave Desert. The purpose of the Center is to provide opportunities to conduct research, receive instruction and experience the Mojave Desert environment. It is officially operated by the California Desert Studies Consortium, a consortium of 7 CSU campuses: Dominguez Hills, Fullerton, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Northridge, San Bernardino and Cal Poly Pomona.
Before the Center, the site was the Zzyzx Mineral Springs and Health Spa, run by Curtis Howe Springer from 1944 to 1974 without federal permission. After Springer was ejected, the CSU negotiated usage of the abandoned buildings of the health spa with the Bureau of Land Management, and in 1976, they signed a five-year cooperative management study for the Desert Studies Consortium to manage 1,280 acres (520 ha) at Soda Springs. The consortium continues to manage the site.
The location is especially interesting to biologists because of the many unique species of animals and plants in the area, including the Saratoga Spring pupfish, the Mohave tui chub, and over 200 species of birds.
The center has a 10,000-watt solar panel array.
Famous quotes containing the words desert, studies and/or center:
“What though the traveler tell us of the ruins of Egypt, are we so sick or idle that we must sacrifice our America and today to some man’s ill-remembered and indolent story? Carnac and Luxor are but names, or if their skeletons remain, still more desert sand and at length a wave of the Mediterranean Sea are needed to wash away the filth that attaches to their grandeur. Carnac! Carnac! here is Carnac for me. I behold the columns of a larger
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“These studies which stimulate the young, divert the old, are an ornament in prosperity and a refuge and comfort in adversity; they delight us at home, are no impediment in public life, keep us company at night, in our travels, and whenever we retire to the country.”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)
“It is written in the Book of Usable Minutes
That all things have their center in their dying....”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)