Pain Resistance in Mole-Rats

Naked mole-rat. John Brighenti, via Flickr. Distributed under a CC BY SA 2.0 license.

Naked mole-rats are weird. Native to East Africa, they live underground in highly ordered and hierarchical colonies with a single breeding queen, more like ants or termites than mammals. Some of their most striking physiological adaptations include an extraordinarily long lifespan (30+ years), apparent resistance to cancer, and resistance to extremely low levels of oxygen and high levels of carbon dioxide.

But it turns out naked mole-rats are not completely alone; they come from a family of weirdos. In my latest Animal Minds post, I discuss what researchers have discovered about pain insensitivity in naked mole-rats and some of their close relatives.

Read the story here: Pain Insensitivity in Mole-Rats.