The role of the initial concentration of anaerobic growth factors (AGF) on interactions between Torulaspora delbrueckii and Saccharomyces cerevisiae was investigated in strict anaerobiosis. Experiments were performed in a synthetic grape must medium in a membrane bioreactor, a special tool designed for studying direct and indirect interactions between microorganisms. In pure culture fermentations, increased AGF concentration had no impact on S. cerevisiae behaviour, whereas it induced an extension of T. delbrueckii latency. Surprisingly, T. delbrueckii used only 75 to 80% of the consumed sugar to produce biomass, glycerol and ethanol. Physical separation influenced the population dynamics of cofermentations. S.cerevisiae dominated the co-cultures having a single dose of AGF as its presence indirectly induced a decrease in numbers of living T. delbrueckii cells and physical contact with T. delbrueckii stimulated S.cerevisiae growth. Increasing the AGF initial concentration completely upset this domination: S. cerevisiae growth was not stimulated and T. delbrueckii living cells did not decrease. Yeasts incorporate exogenous AGFs, which probably impact their response to competing yeasts. The increase in AGF might have induced changes in the lipid composition of the T. delbrueckii membrane, which would hinder its interaction with S. cerevisiae antimicrobial peptides. The initial concentration of anaerobic growth factors influenced co-culture fermentation population dynamics tremendously, thus highlighting a new way to monitor population evolution and eventually wine organoleptic properties.

Aim: The objective of the present work is to propose a model describing the evolution of the pure culture fermentation of two oenological yeasts: S. cerevisiae and T. delbrueckii.Methods and results: For both yeasts, pure culture fermentation was performed in a synthetic medium with different initial concentrations of yeast available nitrogen. The datasets obtained from those experiments were used to identify the parameters of the proposed model.Conclusions: The developed comprehensive model of wine-making fermentation is based on the partition of assimilated nitrogen between the constitutive and the storage compartments. It efficiently describes the evolution of S. cerevisiae and T. delbrueckii pure cultures. This mass-balance model provides a stoichiometric approach in biomass production, unlike nitrogen backboned models used in winemaking. Moreover, it gives an estimation of non-accessed data such as nitrogen partition between vacuole and cytosol during T. delbrueckii fermentation.Significance and impact of the study: The developed model is robust enough to precisely describe the fermentation evolution of two pure culture yeasts and therefore has future potential for modelling mixed culture fermentations of S. cerevisiae and T. delbrueckii.