Why Does Rats Have Bones?
WouterThere’s a popular misconception about rats: they don’t have bones! But the truth is that they have a perfectly normal skeleton, and these bones allow them to squeeze through tiny spaces. The shape of their bones also makes them flexible, allowing them to squeeze through a wide variety of small spaces without too much trouble.
Rats have a very complex skeleton, and scientists are still learning about it. They have five cranial ridges and about twenty coccygeal vertebrae. The quality of their skeletons is determined by their bone mineral density and cancellous structure. This means that they can be used in a number of experiments in medicine, and they are a wonderful choice for these types of studies.
Rats have similar structures to humans and other mammals, including a temporal bone. It is located on the lateral side of the skull and contributes to the formation of the middle and posterior cranial fossas. In addition, the rat temporal bone is bounded by the parietal bone superiorly and the sphenoid bone medially. It also contains the superior vestibular nerve bundle, which supplies the lateral semicircular canals and the macula of utricle.
The perinatal period is also important for bone development. In toxicity studies, the extent of prenatal ossification has been used as an indicator of fetal development. This is measured using radiography and bone-specific dyes. The fewer ossified bones, the lower the fetal maturity.
