The naked mole-rat (''Heterocephalus glaber''), also known as the sand puppy,
is a burrowing rodent native to the
Horn of Africa
The Horn of Africa (HoA), also known as the Somali Peninsula, is a large peninsula and geopolitical region in East Africa.Robert Stock, ''Africa South of the Sahara, Second Edition: A Geographical Interpretation'', (The Guilford Press; 2004), ...
and parts of
Kenya
Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...
, notably in
Somali regions. It is closely related to the
blesmol
The blesmols, also known as mole-rats, or African mole-rats, are burrowing rodents of the family Bathyergidae. They represent a distinct evolution of a Subterranean fauna, subterranean life among rodents much like the pocket gophers of North Am ...
s and is the only species in the
genus
Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...
''Heterocephalus''.
The naked mole-rat exhibits a highly unusual set of physiological and behavioral traits that allow it to thrive in a harsh underground environment; most notably its being the only mammalian
thermoconformer with an almost entirely
ectothermic (cold-blooded) form of body temperature regulation, as well as exhibiting
eusociality
Eusociality ( Greek 'good' and social) is the highest level of organization of sociality. It is defined by the following characteristics: cooperative brood care (including care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations wit ...
, a complex social structure including a reproductive division of labor, separation of reproductive and non-reproductive castes, and cooperative care of young. The closely related
Damaraland mole-rat
The Damaraland mole-rat (''Fukomys damarensis''), Damara mole rat or Damaraland blesmol, is a burrowing rodent found in southern Africa. Along with the smaller, less hairy, naked mole rat, it is a species of eusociality, eusocial mammal. Descript ...
(''Fukomys damarensis'') is the only other known eusocial mammal.
Naked mole-rats lack pain sensitivity in their skin, and have very low
metabolic
Metabolism (, from ''metabolē'', "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cellular processes; the ...
and
respiratory rates. The animal also is remarkable for its longevity and resistance to
cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving Cell growth#Disorders, abnormal cell growth with the potential to Invasion (cancer), invade or Metastasis, spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Po ...
and
oxygen deprivation.
While formerly considered to belong to the same family as other African mole-rats,
Bathyergidae, more recent investigation places it in a separate family, Heterocephalidae.
Description
Typical individuals are long and weigh . Breeding females are larger and may weigh well over , the largest reaching . They are well adapted to their underground existence. Their eyes are quite small, and their visual acuity is poor. Their legs are thin and short; however, they are highly adept at moving underground and can move backward as fast as they can move forward. Their large, protruding teeth are used to dig and their lips are sealed just behind the teeth, preventing soil from filling their mouths while digging. About a quarter of their musculature is used in the closing of their jaws while they dig. They have little hair (hence the common name) and wrinkled pink or yellowish skin. They lack an insulating layer in the skin.
Physiology
Metabolism and respiration
The naked mole-rat is well adapted to the limited availability of
oxygen
Oxygen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol O and atomic number 8. It is a member of the chalcogen group (periodic table), group in the periodic table, a highly reactivity (chemistry), reactive nonmetal (chemistry), non ...
within the tunnels of its typical habitat. It has underdeveloped
lung
The lungs are the primary Organ (biology), organs of the respiratory system in many animals, including humans. In mammals and most other tetrapods, two lungs are located near the Vertebral column, backbone on either side of the heart. Their ...
s and its
hemoglobin
Hemoglobin (haemoglobin, Hb or Hgb) is a protein containing iron that facilitates the transportation of oxygen in red blood cells. Almost all vertebrates contain hemoglobin, with the sole exception of the fish family Channichthyidae. Hemoglobin ...
has a high affinity for oxygen, increasing the efficiency of oxygen uptake.
It has a very low respiration and metabolic rate for an animal of its size, about 70% that of a mouse, thus using oxygen minimally. In response to long periods of hunger, its metabolic rate can be reduced by up to 25 percent.
The naked mole-rat survives for at least 5 hours in air that contains only 5% oxygen; it does not show any significant signs of distress and continues normal activity. It can live in an atmosphere of 80% and 20% oxygen. In zero-oxygen atmosphere, it can survive 18 minutes apparently without suffering any harm (but none survived a test of 30 minutes). During the anoxic period it loses consciousness, its heart rate drops from about 200 to 50 beats per minute, and breathing stops apart from sporadic breathing attempts. When deprived of oxygen, the animal uses
fructose
Fructose (), or fruit sugar, is a Ketose, ketonic monosaccharide, simple sugar found in many plants, where it is often bonded to glucose to form the disaccharide sucrose. It is one of the three dietary monosaccharides, along with glucose and gal ...
in its
anaerobic
Anaerobic means "living, active, occurring, or existing in the absence of free oxygen", as opposed to aerobic which means "living, active, or occurring only in the presence of oxygen." Anaerobic may also refer to:
*Adhesive#Anaerobic, Anaerobic ad ...
glycolysis
Glycolysis is the metabolic pathway that converts glucose () into pyruvic acid, pyruvate and, in most organisms, occurs in the liquid part of cells (the cytosol). The Thermodynamic free energy, free energy released in this process is used to form ...
, producing
lactic acid
Lactic acid is an organic acid. It has the molecular formula C3H6O3. It is white in the solid state and it is miscible with water. When in the dissolved state, it forms a colorless solution. Production includes both artificial synthesis as wel ...
. This pathway is not inhibited by
acidosis
Acidosis is a biological process producing hydrogen ions and increasing their concentration in blood or body fluids. pH is the negative log of hydrogen ion concentration and so it is decreased by a process of acidosis.
Acidemia
The term ac ...
as happens with glycolysis of glucose.
As of 2017, it was not known how the naked mole-rat survives acidosis without tissue damage.
Thermoregulation
The naked mole-rat does not regulate its body temperature in typical mammalian fashion. They are
thermoconformers rather than
thermoregulators in that, unlike other mammals, body temperature tracks ambient temperatures. The relationship between oxygen consumption and ambient temperature switches from a typical
poikilotherm
A poikilotherm () is an animal (Greek ''poikilos'' – 'various', 'spotted', and ''therme'' – 'heat') whose internal temperature varies considerably. Poikilotherms have to survive and adapt to environmental stress. One of the most important s ...
ic pattern to a
homeotherm
Homeothermy, homothermy, or homoiothermy () is thermoregulation that maintains a stable internal body temperature regardless of external influence. This internal body temperature is often, though not necessarily, higher than the immediate envir ...
ic mode when temperature is at 29 °C or higher.
At lower temperatures, naked mole-rats can use behavioral thermoregulation. For example, cold naked mole-rats huddle together or seek shallow parts of the burrows that are warmed by the sun. Conversely, when they get too hot, naked mole-rats retreat to the deeper, cooler parts of the burrows.
Pain insensitivity
The skin of naked mole-rats lacks
neurotransmitter
A neurotransmitter is a signaling molecule secreted by a neuron to affect another cell across a Chemical synapse, synapse. The cell receiving the signal, or target cell, may be another neuron, but could also be a gland or muscle cell.
Neurotra ...
s in their
cutaneous sensory fibers. As a result, the naked mole-rats feel no pain when they are exposed to acid or
capsaicin
Capsaicin (8-methyl-''N''-vanillyl-6-nonenamide) (, rarely ) is an active component of chili peppers, which are plants belonging to the genus ''Capsicum''. It is a potent Irritation, irritant for Mammal, mammals, including humans, and produces ...
. When they are injected with
substance P
Substance P (SP) is an undecapeptide (a peptide composed of a chain of 11 amino acid residues) and a type of neuropeptide, belonging to the tachykinin family of neuropeptides. It acts as a neurotransmitter and a neuromodulator. Substance P ...
, a type of neurotransmitter, the pain signaling works as it does in other mammals but only with capsaicin and not with acids. This is proposed to be an adaptation to the animal living in high levels of
carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalent bond, covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in a gas state at room temperature and at norma ...
due to poorly ventilated living spaces which would cause acid to build up in their body tissues.
Naked mole-rats' substance P deficiency has also been tied to their lack of the histamine-induced itching and scratching behavior typical of rodents.
Resistance to cancer
Naked mole-rats have a high resistance to tumours, although it is likely that they are not entirely immune to related disorders.
A potential mechanism that averts
cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving Cell growth#Disorders, abnormal cell growth with the potential to Invasion (cancer), invade or Metastasis, spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Po ...
is an "over-crowding" gene,
p16
p16 (also known as p16INK4a, cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor 2A, CDKN2A, multiple tumor suppressor 1 and numerous other synonyms), is a protein that slows cell division by slowing the progression of the cell cycle from the G1 phase to the ...
, which prevents cell division once individual cells come into contact (known as "
contact inhibition
In cell biology, contact inhibition refers to two different but closely related phenomena: contact inhibition of locomotion (CIL) and contact inhibition of proliferation (CIP). CIL refers to the avoidance behavior exhibited by fibroblast-like cell ...
"). The cells of most mammals, including naked mole-rats, undergo contact inhibition via the gene
p27 which prevents cellular reproduction at a much higher cell density than p16 does. The combination of p16 and p27 in naked mole-rat cells is a double barrier to uncontrolled cell proliferation, one of the
hallmarks of cancer.
In 2013, scientists reported that the reason naked mole-rats do not get cancer can be attributed to an "extremely high-molecular-mass
hyaluronan
Hyaluronic acid (; abbreviated HA; conjugate acid, conjugate base hyaluronate), also called hyaluronan, is an anion#Anions and cations, anionic, Sulfation, nonsulfated glycosaminoglycan distributed widely throughout connective tissue, connective ...
" (HMW-HA) (a natural sugary substance), which is over "five times larger" than that in cancer-prone humans and cancer-susceptible laboratory animals.
The scientific report was published a month later as the cover story of the journal ''
Nature
Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the Ecosphere (planetary), ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the Scientific law, laws, elements and phenomenon, phenomena of the physic ...
''.
A few months later, the same University of Rochester research team announced that naked mole-rats have
ribosome
Ribosomes () are molecular machine, macromolecular machines, found within all cell (biology), cells, that perform Translation (biology), biological protein synthesis (messenger RNA translation). Ribosomes link amino acids together in the order s ...
s that produce extremely error-free proteins.
Because of both of these discoveries, the journal ''
Science
Science is a systematic discipline that builds and organises knowledge in the form of testable hypotheses and predictions about the universe. Modern science is typically divided into twoor threemajor branches: the natural sciences, which stu ...
'' named the naked mole-rat "Vertebrate of the Year" for 2013.
In 2016, a report was published that recorded the first ever discovered malignancies in two naked mole-rats.
However, both animals were captive-born at zoos, and hence lived in an environment with 21% atmospheric oxygen compared to their natural 2–9%, which may have promoted tumorigenesis.
The
Golan Heights blind mole-rat (''Spalax golani'') and the
Judean Mountains blind mole-rat (''Spalax judaei'') are also resistant to cancer, but by a different mechanism.
In July 2023 a study reported the transference of the gene responsible for HMW-HA from a naked mole rat to mice leading to improved health and an approximate 4.4 percent increase in median lifespan for the mice.
Longevity
Naked mole-rats can live longer than any other rodent, with lifespans in excess of 37 years; the next longest-lived rodent is the
African porcupine at 28 years.
The mortality rate of the species does not increase with age, and thus does not conform to that of most mammals (as frequently defined by the
Gompertz-Makeham law of mortality).
Naked mole-rats are highly resistant to cancer,
and maintain healthy
vascular Vascular can refer to:
* blood vessels, the vascular system in animals
* vascular tissue
Vascular tissue is a complex transporting tissue, formed of more than one cell type, found in vascular plants. The primary components of vascular tissue ...
function longer in their lifespan than shorter-living rats. Queens age more slowly than nonbreeders.
The mechanisms underlying naked mole-rat longevity are debated, but are thought to be related to their ability to substantially reduce their
metabolism
Metabolism (, from ''metabolē'', "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cellular processes; the co ...
in response to adverse conditions, and so prevent aging-induced damage from
oxidative stress
Oxidative stress reflects an imbalance between the systemic manifestation of reactive oxygen species and a biological system's ability to readily detoxify the reactive intermediates or to repair the resulting damage. Disturbances in the normal ...
. This has been referred to as "living their life in pulses". Their longevity has also been attributed to "protein stability".
Because of their extraordinary longevity, an international effort was put into place to sequence the
genome
A genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). The nuclear genome includes protein-coding genes and non-coding genes, other functional regions of the genome such as ...
of the naked mole-rat. A draft genome was made available in 2011 with an improved version released in 2014. Its
somatic number is
2n = 60.
Further
transcriptome
The transcriptome is the set of all RNA transcripts, including coding and non-coding, in an individual or a population of cells. The term can also sometimes be used to refer to all RNAs, or just mRNA, depending on the particular experiment. The ...
sequencing revealed that genes related to
mitochondria
A mitochondrion () is an organelle found in the cells of most eukaryotes, such as animals, plants and fungi. Mitochondria have a double membrane structure and use aerobic respiration to generate adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which is us ...
and oxidation reduction are expressed more than they are in mice, which may contribute to their longevity.
The
DNA repair
DNA repair is a collection of processes by which a cell (biology), cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. A weakened capacity for DNA repair is a risk factor for the development of cancer. DNA is cons ...
transcriptome
The transcriptome is the set of all RNA transcripts, including coding and non-coding, in an individual or a population of cells. The term can also sometimes be used to refer to all RNAs, or just mRNA, depending on the particular experiment. The ...
s of the liver of humans, naked mole-rats, and mice were compared.
The maximum lifespans of humans, naked mole-rats, and mice are respectively c. 120, 30 and 3 years. The longer-lived species, humans and naked mole-rats, expressed DNA repair genes, including core genes in several DNA repair pathways, at a higher level than did mice. In addition, several DNA repair pathways in humans and naked mole-rats were up-regulated compared with mice. These findings suggest that increased DNA repair facilitates greater longevity, and also are consistent with the
DNA damage theory of aging
The DNA damage theory of aging proposes that aging is a consequence of unrepaired accumulation of DNA damage (naturally occurring), naturally occurring DNA damage. Damage in this context is a DNA alteration that has an abnormal structure. Although ...
.
Size
Reproducing females become the dominant female, usually by founding new colonies, fighting for the dominant position, or taking over once the reproducing female dies. These reproducing females tend to have longer bodies than that of their non-reproducing counterparts of the same skull width. The measurements of females before they became reproductive and after show significant increases in body size. It is believed that this trait does not occur due to pre-existing morphological differences but to the actual attainment of the dominant female position. As with the reproductive females, the reproductive males also appear to be larger than their non-reproducing counterparts but the difference is smaller than in females. These males also have visible outlines of the testes through the skin of their abdomens. Unlike the females, there are usually multiple reproducing males.
Chronobiology
The naked mole-rat's subterranean habitat imposes constraints on its
circadian rhythm
A circadian rhythm (), or circadian cycle, is a natural oscillation that repeats roughly every 24 hours. Circadian rhythms can refer to any process that originates within an organism (i.e., Endogeny (biology), endogenous) and responds to the env ...
.
Living in
constant darkness, most individuals possess a free-running
activity pattern and are active both day and night, sleeping for short periods several times in between.
However, colonies do not exhibit synchronized circadian sleep-wake cycles.
Ecology and behavior
Distribution and habitat
The naked mole-rat is native to the drier parts of the tropical grasslands of East Africa, predominantly southern
Ethiopia
Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...
,
Kenya
Kenya, officially the Republic of Kenya, is a country located in East Africa. With an estimated population of more than 52.4 million as of mid-2024, Kenya is the 27th-most-populous country in the world and the 7th most populous in Africa. ...
, and
Somalia
Somalia, officially the Federal Republic of Somalia, is the easternmost country in continental Africa. The country is located in the Horn of Africa and is bordered by Ethiopia to the west, Djibouti to the northwest, Kenya to the southwest, th ...
.
Roles
The naked mole-rat was the first mammal found to be
eusocial
Eusociality ( Greek 'good' and social) is the highest level of organization of sociality. It is defined by the following characteristics: cooperative brood care (including care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations wit ...
. The
Damaraland mole-rat
The Damaraland mole-rat (''Fukomys damarensis''), Damara mole rat or Damaraland blesmol, is a burrowing rodent found in southern Africa. Along with the smaller, less hairy, naked mole rat, it is a species of eusociality, eusocial mammal. Descript ...
(''Fukomys damarensis'') is the only other eusocial mammal currently known.
The social structure of naked mole-rats is similar to that of
ant
Ants are Eusociality, eusocial insects of the Family (biology), family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the Taxonomy (biology), order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from Vespoidea, vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cre ...
s,
termite
Termites are a group of detritivore, detritophagous Eusociality, eusocial cockroaches which consume a variety of Detritus, decaying plant material, generally in the form of wood, Plant litter, leaf litter, and Humus, soil humus. They are dist ...
s, and some
bees and
wasp
A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder ...
s.
Only one female (the queen) and one to three males reproduce, while the rest of the members of the colony function as workers. The queen and breeding males are able to breed at one year of age. Workers are sociologically but not physiologically sterile.
Smaller workers focus on gathering food and maintaining the nest, while larger workers are the tunnelers, and are the most reactive to threats. The non-reproducing females appear to be reproductively suppressed, meaning the ovaries do not fully mature, and do not have the same levels of certain hormones as the reproducing females. By contrast, there is little difference of hormone concentration between reproducing and non-reproducing males. In experiments where the reproductive female was removed or died, one of the non-reproducing females would take over and become sexually active. Non-reproducing members of the colony cooperate to care for the pups produced by the queen (usually their mother or sister). Workers keep the pups from straying out of the nest, groom the pups, and snuggle to keep them warm, extend tunnels in search of food, bring food to the nest, and defend pups from attacks by predators and foreign colonies.
Queen and gestation
The relationships between the queen and the breeding males may last for many years; other females are temporarily sterile. Queens live from 13 to 18 years, and are extremely hostile to other females that attempt to exert physical dominance, or that produce hormones associated with becoming queens. When the queen dies, another female takes her place, often after a violent struggle with her competitors. Once established, the new queen's body expands the space between the
vertebrae
Each vertebra (: vertebrae) is an irregular bone with a complex structure composed of bone and some hyaline cartilage, that make up the vertebral column or spine, of vertebrates. The proportions of the vertebrae differ according to their spinal ...
in her backbone to become longer and ready to bear pups.
In the wild, naked mole-rats usually breed once a year, if the litter survives. In captivity, they breed all year long and can produce a litter every 80 days.
Gestation lasts about 70 days. Litter size is typically 3 to 12 pups; the average litter size is 11-12
The young are born blind and weigh about . The queen nurses them for the first month, after which the other members of the colony feed them
fecal pap until they are old enough to eat solid food.
In most female mammals the number of mammae is about double the average litter size. Presumably this enables females to successfully nurse litters even if some mammae fail to produce milk. Naked mole-rats break this "one-half rule" – field caught and lab born litters averaged 11 to 12 pups, and numbers of mammae on wild and captive females were similarly 11 to 12. Maximum litter sizes were 28 in the field and 27 in captivity, whereas the maximum number of mammae was 15. Breeding female naked mole-rats can bear and successfully rear litters that are far more numerous than their mammae because young take turns nursing from the same mammary and breeding females and pups are fed and protected by colony mates, enabling queens to concentrate their reproductive efforts on gestation and lactation.
Workers
The queen is the most active member of a colony, and she induces workers to increase their activities by repeatedly shoving them. Smaller workers focus on acquiring food and maintaining tunnels, while the larger workers react strongly to disturbances. As in honey bees, the workers are divided along a continuum of different worker-caste behaviors instead of being in discrete groups. Larger workers function primarily as tunnellers, expanding the large network of tunnels within the burrow system, ejecting earth excavated during tunneling onto the ground surface, and as
soldier
A soldier is a person who is a member of an army. A soldier can be a Conscription, conscripted or volunteer Enlisted rank, enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, a warrant officer, or an Officer (armed forces), officer.
Etymology
The wo ...
s, protecting the group from outside
predators
Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill ...
. Smaller workers perform colony maintenance tasks such as foraging, nest building, and pup care. Workers that find new food sources (tubers) in their vast subterranean burrow systems give a special vocalization on their way back to the nest and wave the food around once they get there. Recruits find the new site by following an odour trail left by the initial scout -- a behavior somewhat analogous to trail deposition and following by ants and termites.
Dispersers
Inbreeding
Inbreeding is the production of offspring from the mating or breeding of individuals or organisms that are closely genetic distance, related genetically. By analogy, the term is used in human reproduction, but more commonly refers to the genet ...
is common among naked mole-rats within a colony
This results in colony members being extremely closely related, which in turn favors nepotism among non-breeders toward siblings. However, prolonged inbreeding is usually associated with lower
fitness. The discovery of male and female dispersers has revealed that there is a mechanism of inter-colony outbreeding. Dispersers are morphologically, physiologically and behaviorally distinct from colony members and actively seek to leave their burrow when an escape opportunity presents itself.
These individuals are equipped with generous fat reserves for their journey.
Though they possess high levels of
luteinizing hormone
Luteinizing hormone (LH, also known as luteinising hormone, lutropin and sometimes lutrophin) is a hormone produced by gonadotropic cells in the anterior pituitary gland. The production of LH is regulated by gonadotropin-releasing hormone (G ...
, dispersers are only interested in mating with individuals from foreign colonies rather than their own colony's queen.
They also show little interest in working cooperatively with colony members in their natal burrow.
Hence, disperser morphs are well-prepared to promote the establishment of new, initially outbred colonies, before cycles of inbreeding resume.
Colonies
Colonies average 75-80 individuals, but may contain more than 300, and their tunnel systems can stretch 3 to 5 kilometres (2–3 mi) in cumulative length.
Laboratory colonies are xenophobic, and will attack and kill invaders from different colonies. Likewise, wild colonies sometimes expand their territories by invading neighboring colonies. Invaders may kidnap small pups and incorporate them into their own colony's workforce, an intriguing convergence with the behavior of slave-making ants.
Female mate choice
In lab experiments, reproductively active female naked mole rats tended to associate with unfamiliar males (usually non-kin) when given a choice, whereas reproductively inactive females did not discriminate.
The preference of queens for unfamiliar males likely is an adaptation to reduce inbreeding; however, within established colonies queens rarely have opportunities to express such preferences. Evolutionarily, outbreeding may be preferred because it reduces the likelihood of expressing deleterious recessive alleles,
whereas inbreeding results in closer genetic relationships among naked mole-rat families, favoring self-sacrificial and nepotistic behaviors.
Diet

Naked mole-rats feed primarily on very large
tuber
Tubers are a type of enlarged structure that plants use as storage organs for nutrients, derived from stems or roots. Tubers help plants perennate (survive winter or dry months), provide energy and nutrients, and are a means of asexual reproduc ...
s (weighing as much as a thousand times the body weight of a typical mole-rat) that they find deep underground through their mining operations. A single tuber can provide a colony with a long-term source of food—lasting for months, or even years, as they eat the inside but leave the outside, allowing the tuber to regenerate.
Symbiotic
Symbiosis (Ancient Greek : living with, companionship < : together; and ''bíōsis'': living) is any type of a close and long-term biolo ...
bacteria
Bacteria (; : bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one Cell (biology), biological cell. They constitute a large domain (biology), domain of Prokaryote, prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micr ...
in the mole-rats' intestines ferment the fibres, allowing otherwise indigestible cellulose to be turned into volatile
fatty acid
In chemistry, in particular in biochemistry, a fatty acid is a carboxylic acid with an aliphatic chain, which is either saturated and unsaturated compounds#Organic chemistry, saturated or unsaturated. Most naturally occurring fatty acids have an ...
s.
Naked mole-rats sometimes also
eat their own feces. This behavior not only nourishes pups post-weaning but also is part of their eusocial behavior: a mechanism of sharing and assessing hormones from the queen.
Predators
Naked mole rats are primarily preyed upon by snakes—especially the
Rufous beaked snake and
Kenyan sand boa—as well as honey badgers and various
raptors. They are at their most vulnerable when "volcanoing" (ejecting soil to the surface).
Conservation status
Naked mole-rats are not threatened. They are widespread, numerous and, being subterranean, essentially unnoticeable in the drier regions of
East Africa
East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the Africa, African continent, distinguished by its unique geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the regi ...
(except for their small "volcanoes" of ejected earth).
International Union for Conservation of Nature
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the stat ...
Red List: Heterocephalus Glaber listed as "least concern".
''The Photo Ark''
A naked mole-rat living at the Lincoln Children's Zoo was the first animal to be photographed for the
National Geographic
''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...
project, ''
The Photo Ark'', which has the goal of photographing all species living in zoos and wildlife sanctuaries around the globe in order to inspire action to save wildlife.
References
Further reading
*
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External links
*
{{Portal bar, Mammals, Animals, Biology, Africa
Phiomorpha
Coprophagous animals
Extant Zanclean first appearances
Fauna of the Horn of Africa
Fauna of Kenya
Mammals described in 1842
Negligibly senescent organisms
Rodents of Africa
Taxa named by Eduard Rüppell