Colony member recognition and xenophobia in the naked mole-rat

Olfaction and social cognition in eusocial naked mole-rats, Heterocephalus glaber

“…Consistent with O'Riain and Jarvis (1997), naked mole-rats showed a strong preference for their own colony odour. Animals spent significantly more time smelling the familiar bedding, despite always exploring both bedding sources.…”

“…However, olfaction is the most common mechanism of conspecific identification among more traditional laboratory rodents (e.g. Petrulis, 2009), and naked mole-rats appear to have distinct colony (O'Riain & Jarvis, 1997) and individual (Clarke & Faulkes, 1999) odours, suggesting that olfaction serves an important social function in this species as well. Furthermore, African mole-rats show a large number of functional polymorphisms in their olfactory receptor genes, which might contribute to enhanced olfaction (Stathopoulos, Bishop, & O'Ryan, 2014).…”

Morphological castes in a vertebrate

“…The nest is expandable and thus able to accommodate individuals recruited in successive generations. Reproductives, in particular the breeding female, rarely engage in risky behaviors, such as colony defense (31), and their overall contribution to the colonies' task schedule is minimal (16,17). All colony members are dependent on a communal nest for efficient thermoregulation (32), and thus the breeding female is able to closely monitor colony activities and the reproductive status of all colony members.…”

The Role of the Immune System in Behavioral Strategies of Reproduction

“…Eusocial naked mole-rat, Heterocephalus glaber, for example, appear to lack incest avoidance and genetic variation within colonies is low [182][183][184]. These animals are highly xenobiotic, even to closely related foreign conspecifics [185]. However, in choice tests in which the odor, social and mate preferences of naked mole-rat were determined, reproductively active females often prefer to associate with unfamiliar males [186].…”