The naked mole-rat has inspired cartoon characters and even comics<\/a>. And on Wednesday, a study published in the journal Science Advances<\/a> added another chapter to its legend: when the queen of the colony loses power, her subjects don\u2019t kill each other to replace her. They can do something far more surprising. They can wait.<\/p>\n The story begins in July 2019 at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California. A colony of six animals arrived at Janelle Ayres\u2019s lab: a queen of unknown age named Ter\u00e9, a male named Paquito, and their first litter. The colony was named \u201cLos Amigos.\u201d The offspring were also given names, some taken from J. R. R. Tolkien\u2019s Lord of the Rings<\/a>, such as Arwen, the beautiful elf whose destiny is intertwined with that of the human Aragorn. Ayres, the study\u2019s lead researcher, explains that naming the individuals makes tracking them over time easier, and reflects \u201ca respectful acknowledgment of their individuality, without sacrificing scientific objectivity.\u201d<\/p>\n For the first few months, Ter\u00e9 behaved like a model queen. She produced litters regularly, at intervals of 76 to 81 days, with six to 10 pups each, and a 100% survival rate. There was no aggression in the colony. The social structure was clear. But naked mole-rat colonies are living systems, and scientists wanted to know what happens when something unexpected occurs within that system.<\/p>\n In the world of the naked mole-rat, reproduction is a one-woman affair. Colonies are organized around this single breeding female, the queen, who monopolizes the rearing process. The queen actively suppresses ovulation in subordinate females through intimidation (biting or pushing them), chemical signals, and possibly physiological mechanisms that are not yet fully understood. It is a biological dictatorship.<\/p>\n What was known until now is that when the queen dies or disappears, the order violently breaks down. Subordinate females compete to assume the reproductive role, leading to a lot of aggression and continuous wars for succession: blood decides who rules.<\/p>\n But Ayres and her team suspected there might be another way. To find out, they needed a long experiment (it took six years), patience, and a colony they knew animal by animal. Los Amigos were perfect.<\/p>\n The researchers subjected the colony to two types of stress, both known to disrupt reproduction in rodents. The first was overcrowding. When the colony reached 39 animals, the queen continued to become pregnant and give birth to normal-sized litters, but all the pups died. The stress affected the newborns, not Ter\u00e9\u2019s fertility. And no subordinate took advantage of the queen\u2019s reproductive weakness to try to usurp her throne.<\/p>\n The second disturbance was more powerful: a move. In May 2022, the entire colony was relocated to another building on the same campus. The environmental conditions \u2014 temperature, humidity, light cycle \u2014 were identical. But something changed. Ter\u00e9\u2019s reproductive capacity stopped completely. For the next year, she maintained a stable weight, and clinical examinations revealed no evidence of pregnancy. A year without offspring, with no apparent explanation. And again, no aggression.<\/p>\n It was during this long pause that researchers began to notice something new: in the fall of 2023, Ter\u00e9 tentatively resumed breeding with litters of one or two pups that didn\u2019t survive. But, meanwhile, one of her daughters, Alexandria, began to show signs of pregnancy. A second breeding female had emerged in the colony, something that hadn\u2019t been documented before. And without anyone fighting over the role<\/a>.<\/p>\n This parallel reproduction occurred without any aggression, dominance challenges, or social instability in the colony. Ter\u00e9 and Alexandria were, in their own way, sharing the throne. Alexandria died shortly afterward, but another of Ter\u00e9\u2019s daughters from the same litter, Arwen, began to show the same signs of pregnancy. In October 2025, Arwen gave birth to two pups that survived \u2014 the first to do so since 2023. Researchers documented that Ter\u00e9 displayed \u201cguarding\u201d behavior toward Arwen and her litter, without any signs of conflict. The succession was complete \u2014 without violence or bloodshed. The queen mother relinquished power to her daughter, and she took it without any need to seize it.<\/p>\n Ayres is cautious about how much this finding reflects what happens in nature. \u201cOur findings show that naked mole-rats are capable of peaceful succession, in addition to the more widely recognized aggressive pathway,\u201d she says. \u201cHowever, it remains to be determined whether this alternative strategy is used in natural environments.\u201d<\/p>\n What the study does confirm is the existence of this flexibility, this \u201chidden path,\u201d as the authors themselves call it. The findings reveal a \u201csocial plasticity,\u201d they say, that had never been observed in this animal, traditionally subject to the queen\u2019s strict hierarchy<\/a>.<\/p>\n What determines which path a colony takes? Ayres has a hypothesis: \u201cIt is reasonable to speculate that succession depends not only on social stability and reproductive competition, but also on a cost-benefit analysis. When the cost of conflict is too high, a peaceful transition may be favored.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/SGG27ECUAJCKDFL4QG5D7D3THU.jpg\")
A colony of naked mole-rats.Roxiller (Getty Images)<\/p>\n