By Susan Milius
Damaraland mole-rats live underground in rodent versions of beehives, but their family ties aren’t very beelike, according to a new analysis of their genetics.
Bees, ants, and some other truly social insects inherit genes in such a way that sisters tend to share exactly the same forms of an especially large proportion of their genes. Theorists have speculated that such extraclose kinship invited the evolution of the beehive social life.
Scientists have mused that inbreeding might also create an extraordinary degree of kinship among the two species of mole-rats that live in supersocial colonies.