Genetic drift in industrial yeast strains used for brewing and biofuel production
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Nottingham
Department Name: Sch of Biosciences
Abstract
Genetic drift in industrial yeast strains used for brewing and biofuel production
Organisations
People |
ORCID iD |
| Chris Powell (Primary Supervisor) | |
| Zoe Wilson (Primary Supervisor) |
Studentship Projects
| Project Reference | Relationship | Related To | Start | End | Student Name |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BB/M008770/1 | 01/10/2015 | 31/10/2024 | |||
| 1944682 | Studentship | BB/M008770/1 | 01/10/2017 | 30/09/2021 |
| Description | Firstly, the title of my work is now "The impact of process, product and environment on the microbiome and metabolome of draught beer" Our work, focusses on the microbiology and metabolome of draught beer. Put simply, we firstly investigated the contaminants of draught beer at the point of dispense. Hypothesising that draught beer microbiology is significantly more complex than previously thought and we aimed to fill this gap in knowledge. Previous work in this field is outdated and used methods that cannot effectively nor efficiently identify inhabitants of a given environment. Therefore, using the modern technologies such as sequencing etc. we were able to determine the microbial inhabitants of draught beer in a range of styles across the the East Midlands. This initial work concluded that draught beer microbiology is significantly more complex than previously thought. Further identifying that beer contaminants are not universal and are directly influenced by style and location. Finally, this work also determined that beers (even those of the same style i.e. lager) differed in their susceptibility to spoilage, suggesting the environmental niches to specific beers are key to creating a robust beer that has an increased shelf-life and maintains the condition and quality set by the brewery when being packaged into keg/bottle/can. The second part of this work aims to identify these environmental niches and by using techniques such as Mass Spectrometry, which identifies molecules based on their mass, enabling us to understand what environmental characteristics of a beer are important for a increased resilience to spoilage. |
| Exploitation Route | The outcomes of this work should fundamentally show brewers and pubs that draught beer is by no means a clean beverage and should be kept to standards as those depicted in restaurants by the FDA. Although pathogens are not capable of growing in beer, it does not means that it should be allowed to be served unhygienically. It is our hope that people begin to take notice and begin understanding the importance of managing beer lines and introducing proper hygienic standards when managing their beer lines to ensure that all beverages served are of a high quality and uncontaminated. It is also predicted, and has been previously shown in other works, that serving high quality beer would also lead to an increase in profits. |
| Sectors | Agriculture, Food and Drink |