Saccharomyces cerevisiae associated with the spontaneous fermentation of tequila agave juice

Abstract

Saccharomyces cerevisiae dominates the spontaneous fermentation of blue agave juice. Because of the batch heterogeneity, the aim of this work was to determine the strain diversity of S. cerevisiae among fermentations. During January and February 2015, agave juice was sampled in triplicate from four sampling points at a tequila distillery. The heterogeneity of yeast strains and the production of carbon dioxide were assessed during fermentation, whereas the amount of ethanol produced was measured at the end of the process. The fermentation cycle times varied widely (9 to 25 days), as did fermentation efficiency (2.5–45.5%). Yeast isolates were identified at the species level by ITS-5.8S rRNA restriction fragment length polymorphism and differentiated at the strain level by random amplified polymorphic DNA. A total of 199 isolates were obtained and identified as S. cerevisiae, showing 69 different random amplified polymorphic DNA profiles. There was no clear dominance of any strain during fermentation. However, two strains (P1 and P2) were detected in all fermentation samples, suggesting their residency in the distillery, despite the deep-cleaning applied to the tanks after each fermentation batch. According to the RAPD profiles, the number of strains isolated from fermentation samples increased from 17 in January to 25 in February. © 2018 The Institute of Brewing & Distilling.