Evidence for S. cerevisiae fermentation in ancient wine.
Saccharomyces cerevisiae is the principal yeast used in modern fermentation processes, including winemaking, breadmaking, and brewing. From residue present inside one of the earliest known wine jars from Egypt, we have extracted, amplified, and sequenced ribosomal DNA from S. cerevisiae. These results indicate that this organism was probably responsible for wine fermentation by at least 3150 B.C. This inference has major implications for the evolution of bread and beer yeasts, since it suggests that S. cerevisiae yeast, which occurs naturally on the surface bloom of grapes, was also used as an inoculum to ferment cereal products.
Bauer Center for Genomics Research, Harvard University, 7 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. Dcavalieri@cgr.harvard.edu
Duccio
D
Cavalieri
Patrick E
PE
McGovern
Daniel L
DL
Hartl
Robert
R
Mortimer
Mario
M
Polsinelli
D001483:Base Sequence; D017931:DNA Primers; D004271:DNA, Fungal / Q000302:isolation & purification; D004275:DNA, Ribosomal; D004534:Egypt; D005285:Fermentation; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000235:genetics*; D012641:Selection, Genetic; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D014920:Wine
D017931:DNA Primers; D004271:DNA, Fungal; D004275:DNA, Ribosomal