On the origins of wine yeast

Mortimer, Robert; Polsinelli, Mario

doi:10.1016/s0923-2508(99)80036-9

Cited by 319 publications

(276 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Answering this question might furnish fundamental information regarding its evolution. It must be noted that S. cerevisiae is not airborne, but requires a vector to move (23). Several studies show a flow of S. cerevisiae cells among wineries and natural environments (24), probably favored by animal vectors (25).…”

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confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, these authors showed that yeast cells persisted in the bird's gut for no longer than 12 h, indicating that birds cannot act as environmental reservoirs for this microorganism. It has been reported that yeasts are associated with insects (23,(27)(28)(29) during grape harvest season. Stevic et al (30) showed that bees and wasps act as carriers of yeasts in autumn and that honey bee hives contain yeasts during the winter.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Role of social wasps in Saccharomyces cerevisiae ecology and evolution

Stefanini

Dapporto

Legras

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Saccharomyces cerevisiae is one of the most important model organisms and has been a valuable asset to human civilization. However, despite its extensive use in the last 9,000 y, the existence of a seasonal cycle outside human-made environments has not yet been described. We demonstrate the role of social wasps as vector and natural reservoir of S. cerevisiae during all seasons. We provide experimental evidence that queens of social wasps overwintering as adults (Vespa crabro and Polistes spp.) can harbor yeast cells from autumn to spring and transmit them to their progeny. This result is mirrored by field surveys of the genetic variability of natural strains of yeast. Microsatellites and sequences of a selected set of loci able to recapitulate the yeast strain's evolutionary history were used to compare 17 environmental wasp isolates with a collection of strains from grapes from the same region and more than 230 strains representing worldwide yeast variation. The wasp isolates fall into subclusters representing the overall ecological and industrial yeast diversity of their geographic origin. Our findings indicate that wasps are a key environmental niche for the evolution of natural S. cerevisiae populations, the dispersion of yeast cells in the environment, and the maintenance of their diversity. The close relatedness of several wasp isolates with grape and wine isolates reflects the crucial role of human activities on yeast population structure, through clonal expansion and selection of specific strains during the biotransformation of fermented foods, followed by dispersal mediated by insects and other animals. evolutionary biology | genomics

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confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Role of social wasps in Saccharomyces cerevisiae ecology and evolution

Stefanini

Dapporto

Legras

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

Self Cite

267

236

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“…Examination of the lifestyle and genetics of yeast in its ecological niche is still in its infancy. In nature, Saccharomyces cerevisiae appears to be one of many opportunistic microorganisms found in rotting fruit (Mortimer and Polsinelli 1999;Fleet 2003). The cells presumably are dormant much of the time.…”

Section: Are the Uncharacterized Genes Needed Only Under Certain Condmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The cells presumably are dormant much of the time. Fruit flies prey on yeast, but they and other insects are also critical to the yeast life cycle, as they are believed to be the primary vector for transport of yeast (Mortimer and Polsinelli 1999). Thus, ability to stick to insects through dormancy, without being eaten, might be a requisite for propagation of wild yeast.…”

Section: Are the Uncharacterized Genes Needed Only Under Certain Condmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why Are There Still Over 1000 Uncharacterized Yeast Genes?

2007

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The yeast genetics community has embraced genomic biology, and there is a general understanding that obtaining a full encyclopedia of functions of the $6000 genes is a worthwhile goal. The yeast literature comprises over 40,000 research papers, and the number of yeast researchers exceeds the number of genes. There are mutated and tagged alleles for virtually every gene, and hundreds of high-throughput data sets and computational analyses have been described. Why, then, are there

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“…In addition, gut passage promotes conditions favorable to outcrossing, explaining high rates of strain diversity in S. cerevisiae. Insects, including wasps, have long been seen to damage grapes, and damaged grapes have much higher frequencies of S. cerevisiae, thus supporting the view that the natural habitat of the yeast is undiscovered and alerting yeast specialists to look elsewhere for wild populations (14). About 300 taxa of Polistes are recognized worldwide, and about 20 are present in the United States.…”

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confidence: 96%