camel discovery

Camelid, especially camel and llama, is a kind of novel source for the research and development of antibody. Compared with other species, camelid members are the only mammals who can produce not only the conventional antibodies composed of heavy chains and light chains, but also novel antibodies only with heavy chains. This novel isotype, known as heavy chain antibody now, can bind antigens despite consisting of just two heavy chains. This isotype occupies about 50% of the mature immunoglobulins in camelids. The heavy chain antibody in camelids has similar Fc domain to the conventional antibody with both CH2 and CH3 regions, while the Fab domain lacks CH1 regions and only has variable regions (VH), named VHH domain. Moreover, the CDR3 loop of VHH domain is much longer than the one in conventional antibodies and sometimes stabilized by a disulfide bond, which may contribute to binding in cavities, such as enzyme and receptor clefts. According to these traits, heavy chain antibody has the potential to recognize a broader range of epitopes than regular antibodies, and this is valuable in pharmaceutical research. In addition, the VHH domain can also be developed as single domain antibody with appropriate modification.
https://www.creative-biolabs.com/monoclonal-camel-antibody-production.html