Blind Mole Rats
The blind mole rat is not an example of poor design.
Blind mole rats. Rudiment with hidden function. Sanyal s 1 jansen hg de grip wj nevo e de jong ww. They have a sensor for magnetic fields similar to those in birds which the mole rats use to orient their nests.
The eye of the blind mole rat spalax ehrenbergi. The naked mole rat and the damaraland mole rat fukomys damarensis are the only known eusocial mammals the highest classification of sociality. As if blind mole rats weren t odd enough creatures already they also do not get cancer.
Blind mole rats live underground in long tunnels on steppe meadows and pastures. Mole rats spend nearly all their lives underground but they are not blind as was long thought and are even color sensitive new research confirms. Blind mole rats may have evolved from spalacids that used their front limbs to dig because their olecranon processes are relatively large relative to the rest of their arms.
Ansell s mole rats are nearly blind but their eyes still come in handy. 1 department of anatomy erasmus university rotterdam the netherlands. Rather it is a marvel of god s creation and perhaps one day soon god who has given man wisdom will allow his intelligently designed image bearers to figure out the blind mole rat s medical mechanisms and use these lowly rodents to help reduce or eliminate cancer in humans.
The olecranon process is a part of the ulna bone where muscles attach and digging animals tend to have enlarged olecranon processes to provide a large surface for their large and powerful muscles to attach. Now geneticists have worked out why the species is spared from the emperor of all maladies. There are many different kinds of mole rats.
The naked mole rat heterocephalus glaber also known as the sand puppy is a burrowing rodent native to parts of east africa it is closely related to the blesmols and is the only species in the genus heterocephalus of the family heterocephalidae. Blind mole rats do not have external eyes although there are rudimentary eyes under the skin. Blind mole rat subfamily spalacinae any of eight species of burrowing rodents living in the eastern mediterranean and black sea regions.
The best known is probably the naked mole rat whose hairless tubular wrinkled body makes it appear a bit like a tiny walrus or perhaps a bratwurst. The feet and claws are surprisingly small for such a.
