Llamas could save us all from the flu. Their blood might hold the key to stopping every flu, every year.

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A llama upon hearing the news that its blood might help save human lives.
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▼ Llamas may be large and fluffy, but their antibodies sure aren’t. And that could be a huge advantage when it comes to fighting human influenza virus.
That’s all according to a new paper in the journal Science, which showed that a therapy based on llama antibodies could protect mice from otherwise lethal doses of the flu. In theory, the technique could eventually be used to manufacture a nasal spray that would act as a so-called universal vaccine, providing long-term protection against all types of the flu.
A shot-free solution to the flu—especially one that we don't need to redesign every year—is obviously great news, but to really appreciate how ingenious this solution could be (assuming that it translates into humans from mouse trials) we have to back up a second to talk about how our bodies normally fight off the flu.
Our immune systems are equipped with a set of B cells capable of making antibodies. These Y-shaped proteins can identify certain regions of an invading virus, thus also enabling the B cells to sound the alarm that there’s a dangerous substance inside your body. Vaccines expose B cells to potential influenza viruses and allow them time to produce lots of antibodies in advance. That way if a flu virus gets in, the antibodies quickly identify the invader and mount an attack.
Human antibodies identify a part of the influenza virus called hemagglutinin or HA, which is a protein on the surface that normally allows the virus to attach to a human cell membrane. The problem is that influenza can mutate the HA region such that it still functions properly, but becomes less identifiable to your antibodies. This is why our flu  vaccines generally don’t have high  efficacy rates—influenza keeps mutating the HA region in order to thwart our defenses.
But while human antibodies attach to a mushroom-like head, there are other, less accessible parts of the HA molecule that don’t mutate much at all. The trouble is that human antibodies are too big to physically reach those bits.
And that’s where the llamas come in. (▪ ▪ ▪)

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