Biodiversity and heterogeneity of spoilage yeasts in relation to food preservation

The objective of this study is to obtain a functional description of a range of spoilage yeast strains (mostly from one species) to quantify the minimum preservation level (pH and acid concentration) that is needed to reduce spoilage risk to acceptable levels. In addition, causes of population heterogeneity and single cell behaviour will be investigated (e.g. by single cell transcriptomics and genome wide association studies (GWAS)) as these may contribute significantly to the variability in within and between strain extreme acid resistance.