It’s not often that your heart is warmed while learning about scientifically calculated distance. But today is your lucky day because this is one of those rare occasions. Not only will this pull on the strings of your second most important organ; it also contains essential information about our favorite feline friends (right up to the domestication of the cheetah), whether they are furry or furless.
Related: 10 fantastic animals with unique environmental adaptations
10 Cat allergies? Enter ‘CRISPR Kitties’
A Virginia biotech company called InBio, which specializes in things like asthma and allergy research, is investigating CRISPR to make one of the world’s most popular pets less allergenic. Such ‘CRISPR kittens’ could be a boon for many people who are prone to sneezing.
Cat allergies affect up to 15% of people, meaning that the “domestic cat is the most common source of mammalian allergen.” Most affected people are attacked by a protein called Fel d 1, which mediates the allergic response in 95% of cat-allergic patients. This allergy-accelerating protein is found in cat saliva and skin oil, and good luck avoiding it.
Fortunately, scientists discovered that this protein apparently doesn’t seem to do anything, and cats can easily live without it. Its real purpose? Who knows. What is known is that targeting the production of this protein through gene editing could be much more effective than allergy pills and other treatments.[1]
9 Contraception for cats
Helping cats live happy, healthy lives also depends on humanely reducing stray populations. However, surgical intervention is required, which takes time and resources. Now scientists have tried a simple, non-surgical ‘gene shot’ on six cats, with promising results.
The small study size was intentional, allowing rigorous scientific examination of each cat and the workings of the new anti-pregnancy approach. As a result, researchers were able to “extensively analyze 15,220 freeze-dried fecal samples for estrogen and progesterone levels and [examine] 1,200 hours of video of mating behavior,” said William Swanson, director of animal research at Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden.
The shot injects a gene into the muscle cells, leading to the pumping of the contraceptive anti-Mullerian hormone (AMH). AMH works by disrupting the development of the egg follicle in the ovaries. Giving cats this gene therapy injection prevented pregnancies for at least two years. Further research is needed to determine its overall safety and efficacy, but it is a fascinating advance for the global well-being of cats.[2]
8 Cats in squares
Cat senses are excellent; their eyes are six times better in low light than ours, so while you may accidentally bump your cat into the dark, your cat will never accidentally bump you into the dark. At least not by accident.
Exceptional visual perception and brain wiring are why cats like to sit in 2D squares or other shapes, even if those shapes are incomplete (i.e. four cutouts placed apart from each other in the shape of a square).
The fact that these appear to create a closed shape is Kanizsa’s square illusion, which takes advantage of our brain’s tendency to fill in the gaps and see contours that aren’t there. The same thing happens in the cat’s mind, meaning your cat will probably love a flat, incomplete square as much (or almost as much) as he will a fresh, cozy box.[3]
7 Leg “Whiskers”
Cats don’t just have whiskers on the whiskered part of their bodies. They also have whiskers on the non-whisker portion of their bodies, including the backs of their legs. These are called carpal vibrissae because carpus means pulse, and vibrissae is the fancy Latin scientific word for whiskers, or technically nose hairs.
Like the whiskers around their snouts, these vibrissae aren’t just for tickling you; they are sensory organs used to perceive a cat’s environment. They can detect small movements, such as changes in air pressure and environment, to help cats navigate their world and achieve their excellent feline agility. Using these wrist whiskers, so to speak, cats can sense surfaces and objects, giving them better spatial awareness, environmental orientation, and hunting skills.[4]
6 Grayish tabby – the first cat
If you have a grayish-dark tabby cat, congratulations, you have your first cat! Our modern domesticated (debatable) cats are known as Felis catusand they are descended from the African Felis silvestris lybica, which actually looks like a tabby cat. Cat pattern is such an essential factor that it helps researchers determine the wildness or relative wildness of a cat.
For example, some coat patterns, including spotty, arose much later in the history of cat domestication due to genetic changes. So, if you have a spotty grimalkin, thank the Middle Ages. But don’t thank it too much, because the overall cat attitude wasn’t always great, to say the least.[5]
5 Will work for food… Not!
Cats prefer to get their food without having to work for it. That’s smart, but also not surprising. What’s surprising is that other animals are the opposite. So much so that scientists at UC Davis did an entire study on cats’ willingness to suffer ruts during their dinner.
It’s called counterfreeloading, which means some animals prefer to work for their meal. According to Mikel Delgado, a cat behaviorist and veterinary researcher at UC Davis, “There is a body of research showing that most species, including birds, rodents, wolves, primates – even giraffes – prefer to work for their food.”
The study provided 17 cats with two food options: simple food on a tray and a food puzzle. Most opted for the easy foods. Possibly because the puzzle did not stimulate cats’ natural behavior, such as ambushing. However, cats still love puzzles, and that’s important because…[6]
4 Cat puzzles Free the hunter
Researchers at UC Davis previously studied cat puzzles to see how cats benefit from them. The survey found that about a third of cat people provided their furry friends with puzzles, although it would probably be best if that number were higher.
Puzzles benefit cats by bringing out their wild foraging instincts. Cats hunted for their food and engaged in additional predatory practices before “humans came along and took their jobs.” The puzzle helps cats’ mental enrichment by giving them their jobs back and restoring a sense of wild achievement, you might say. Additionally, previous research found that puzzles “helped cats with weight loss, anxiety, and urination outside the litter box.”
Unfortunately, many cat owners try to solve puzzles but quickly give up. People should definitely continue with it, the research says, but start with the easy one and work your way up.[7]
3 What cat genetics tells us
According to a study from the University of Missouri, humans have been cat people for longer than some previously thought. While some have said that human-cat relationships really took off 4,000 years ago, possibly around Egypt, gene research pushes that dating back to the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago. When people started stockpiling grains, rodent populations exploded, taking advantage of our hard-won wheat.
Coincidentally, the cat came along to take advantage of the rodents on our hard-won wheat. While large domestic animals such as cattle and horses underwent multiple domestication events, the cat underwent one such transformation, according to cat geneticist and renowned MU professor Leslie A. Lyons. Our cats, which were actually only semi-domesticated, became the cats we know in the Fertile Crescent many millennia ago, and then traveled the world with us.
Importantly, such genetic studies have produced databases that have contributed to significant reductions in certain feline conditions, such as polycystic kidney disease.[8]
2 Colors, patterns and coat length reveal history, temperament and health
Long after the fertility of the Fertile Crescent, cats underwent a second human-assisted transformation during the Classic Period in Egypt, approximately 3,500–4,000 years ago. Further evidence points to attempts to create a leopard cat in China, but such cats (or their relatives) no longer exist.
These findings also highlight how cats conquered the world. Ancient cat DNA from port cities shows that people brought their feline companions aboard their ships, possibly to suppress the rodents that plagued food supplies from ships. Interestingly, studying the evolution of cat colors and patterns links these traits to specific behaviors (such as aggressiveness), origins and disease prevalence.
However, the ancient Egyptians did not revere their cats as we like to think; they practiced various cruel rituals (including the mass creation of cat mills) to appease the gods for their human benefit. That depressing historical road is for another day, though, because this is about happy cats.[9]
1 Finland has created a new cat
The universe released a new type of cat in May 2024, recently described by science. This rare, domesticated Finnish cat has a new coat pattern called ‘salmiak’, and it has a sort of cookies-and-cream look. People in Finland started noticing the pattern around 2007, noting that instead of conventional tuxedos, these black and whites featured a color gradation, like a pinch of salt and pepper. The ombré effect occurs as the coat lightens from root to tip, from black to white.
To make it official, scientists identified the genetic mechanisms in the journal Animal genetics as “a 95 kb deletion downstream of the KIT gene.” Ah, of course, that makes so much sense! In more understandable terms, a missing piece of DNA leads to the ‘salmiak’ coat type, named after a popular type of Finnish salty licorice. Because Finns love licorice for some reason. But they also like cats, so it balances out.[10]