The results may lead to a better understanding of numerous neurodegenerative disorders and diseases such as ADHD and Alzheimer’s.īack on the busy streets of New York City, one particular rat enthusiast, a performing artist and social media phenom named Buddy, is on a crusade to deliver the message to New Yorkers about proper sanitation.

She and her team have made some remarkable discoveries: not only does driving act as a stressbuster for the rats, it also improves their brains’ ability to change and adapt. Kelly Lambert, a behavioural neuroscientist from the University of Richmond, trains rats to drive miniature cars. New science also reveals that studying these masters of adaptation may benefit humans in surprising ways. The city’s rat population is organized into distinct clans who rarely stray more than 100 meters from their home base - a key behaviour that helps keep disease transmission at bay. Wildlife health biologist Kaylee Byers made a cutting-edge discovery on the frontlines of Vancouver’s urban rat kingdom. Travelling along the subterranean highways of subway lines and sewer pipe networks, the rat has a “paw-hold” in every borough of the city, popping up in graveyards, tree-pits, apartment garbage chutes, and even the occasional toilet.ĭespite these daring feats, it turns out there’s a limit to the rat’s sense of adventure. “The rat has learned to live in sewers and skyscrapers, all the way to the top of beautiful $75 million condominiums,” he says in the documentary. In New York City, urban rodentologist Bobby Corrigan takes viewers on a tour of coveted rat real estate. They’re escape artists, problem solvers and master contortionists: supremely equipped to infiltrate our world. Rat City dives down the rathole to uncover remarkable superpowers that make brown rats the evolutionary heroes of the animal kingdom.

“We know more about life on Mars than how rats navigate life on Earth,” says Kaylee Byers, who leads the Vancouver Rat Project. The ubiquitous rodent is one of the most familiar creatures on the planet - but perhaps the least understood. For as long as human civilization has flourished, the brown rat has lived in the shadows, an unwelcome partner thriving in the underbelly of our cities.

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