Editing Rat (section)

==Working rats==
{{main|Working rat}}
{{anchor|Odor detection}}

Rats have been used as working animals. Tasks for working rats include the sniffing of gunpowder residue, [[demining]], acting and [[animal-assisted therapy]]. Rats have a keen sense of smell and are easy to train. These characteristics have been employed, for example, by the Belgian [[non-governmental organization]] [[APOPO]], which trains rats (specifically [[Gambian pouched rat|African giant pouched rats]]) to detect [[landmine]]s and diagnose [[tuberculosis]] through smell.<ref name="Ted.com">{{cite web|url=http://www.ted.com/talks/bart_weetjens_how_i_taught_rats_to_sniff_out_land_mines.html|title=Video of Bart Weetjens talk on use of rats as odour detectors|date=2 December 2010 |publisher=Ted.com|access-date=2012-09-24|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121007002748/http://www.ted.com/talks/bart_weetjens_how_i_taught_rats_to_sniff_out_land_mines.html|archive-date=2012-10-07}}</ref>