Scientists manipulated bats' social relationships — and watched them go from strangers to friends

On 29th August 2019, Lilith, a vampire bat housed in the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, died, leaving behind a pup. Curiously, for Gerry Carter and Imran Razik — the scientists studying these bats — BD, another bat in the colony, whom Lilith had met only two months ago, adopted her pup. In that two-month span, BD and Lilith had evidently formed a close bond. While this is not the first instance of adoption exhibited by vampire bats (or in the animal kingdom), it does raise a peculiar question: if natural selection is about maximizing one's genetic legacy, what does a bat get out of raising the children of an unrelated bats?