It took me a while to post this, but this is some really cool research done by the lab coordinator for the class I teach and his wife, both from Michigan State University! They found that grasshopper mice do not feel pain from the scorpions they eat, even when the scorpions repeatedly sting them in the face. This is pretty amazing, considering "The bark scorpion (Centruroides sculpturatus) delivers one of the most painful stings in the animal kingdom—human victims have compared the experience to being branded."
The grasshopper mice aren't tolerant to all types of pain - they still react to other pain-inducing chemicals, but not the scorpion's venom. This is thought to be an adaptation to allow the grasshopper mice to eat the abundant scorpions as a food source in a desert environment without much other prey.
This ecology research could also prove useful for developing new painkillers that work more effectively in humans.
http://news.sciencemag.org/biology/2013/10/mouse-impervious-scorpions-sting
(includes cool video of the feeding in action!)
The grasshopper mice aren't tolerant to all types of pain - they still react to other pain-inducing chemicals, but not the scorpion's venom. This is thought to be an adaptation to allow the grasshopper mice to eat the abundant scorpions as a food source in a desert environment without much other prey.
This ecology research could also prove useful for developing new painkillers that work more effectively in humans.
http://news.sciencemag.org/biology/2013/10/mouse-impervious-scorpions-sting
(includes cool video of the feeding in action!)
Photo courtesy of Matthew and Ashlee Rowe.