His team analyzed deer -
mouse lung samples that had been stored in a freezer since the 1980s.
When the team looked
at lung samples from victims of the seasonal flu, they found only trace amounts of C4d, which seemed to confirm their suspicions.
A study led by Dr Ben Nicholas, of the University of Southampton, and published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology,
assessed lung samples from asthmatics and healthy volunteers.
The researchers
studied lung samples from a female Australian lungfish, Neoceratodus forsteri, under an electron microscope.
After looking
at lung samples from 75 young and middle - aged adult victims of the 2009 pandemic, they found an uncanny amount of a protein called C4d, a molecule that normally binds to antibodies to form virus - fighting immune complexes.
Similar observations were noted at the Health Protection Agency (HPA) in the UK, where different morphotypes were observed from
lung samples in mice infected with Bps K96243.
Metagenomic identification of a novel anellovirus in Pacific harbor seal (Phoca vitulina richardsii)
lung samples and its detection in samples from multiple years.