RATS are just as stressed by city life as people - and like humans, they also turn to junk food for comfort, scientists say.
Rodents living in densely populated cities like New York are more exposed to disease and health problems due to city-dwelling humans' diets and pollution, forcing their bodies to adapt to their surroundings.
4
4
"Perhaps the most striking commonality between urban humans and rats is their diet..," the researchers wrote in their study.
"Today, the human urban diet contains an increasingly large proportion of highly processed sugars and fats that lead to a number of public health concerns.
"Some of these health concerns could conceivably apply to rats as well."
Population geneticist Arbel Harpak and his team of researchers studied 400 brown rats from around New York City.
They sequenced the full genomes of 29 rats from Manhattan and compared their scans with the genomes of rats from rural China, where the brown rat species originates.
The scientists found that dozens of the rodents' genes showed signs of a "selective sweep", or an evolutionary process where mutations helpful for survival appear so often they eventually become fixed in the population's gene pool.
Harpak noted that their findings point to presumed sweeps associated with metabolism, movement, and diet.
He cited the infamous "Pizza Rat" as an example of urban rats' adaptation abilities.
4
4
RAIN PAINThree weeks of rain set to fall in just two days as 129 flood alerts issued
REVENGEDad who murdered son, 6, by raping him with a stick attacked in court by stepson
'ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL'Special needs teen girl 'stripped' & raped on school bus over 17 DAYS
PURE EVILMom gets life for BEHEADING her daughter, 5, because she asked for cereal
TRAGIC FINDEvelyn Mae Boswell cops find remains believed to be missing 15-month-old
OFF THE RAILSBrazen couple romp in broad daylight on California train platform
The selective sweep can also create colonies of "super rats" in crowded cities.
Unlike typical rats, these genetically mutated rats are larget than average and are resistant to rat poisons often deployed by government officials in an attempt to wipe them out.
Although most populations are successfully wiped out, the remaining rodents develop poison-resistant genes to protect themselves from the next onslaught of rat control methods.
Do you have a story for The US Sun team?
Email us at exclusive@the-sun.com or call 212 416 4552.
See the rest here:
New York rats are stressed by city life and use diets high in sugar and fat to cope with pressure, scientists - The Sun
