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Welcome to YeastBytes |
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| Like a five year old who has just been refused those must have black chunky shoes, here we are kicking and screaming with YeastBytes no.4. Despite the unrelenting pressure, we have stuck to our task to deliver a late summer bumper edition with some more finely honed pieces in our bimonthly homage to all things Saccharomyces. |
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| The lead article in this issue is something of a party political broadcast on behalf of the 'Yeast Supply' party, often seen as failing to punch its weight and grabbing too few votes. This piece focuses on the benefits of yeast supply or management through the eyes of a 'party worker'. Unable to resist the pun, 'freeze dying' hits home on the perils of using dried yeast from commercial collections for yeast supply. For the first time in YeastBytes' young life we take a deep breath and consider the thorny subject of the 'generation game' and the pros and cons of culling and replacing yeast. Next up Cara new boy, Pieter Swanepoel introduces ('passport control') some of the amazing developments in molecular methods that have made strain fingerprinting a quick and cost-effective monitoring tool. YeastBytes regular Chris Giles mulls over the joys of the QA of microbiological media. Finally, in the bizarre corner that is 'did you know?', YeastBytes catches up on the spread of Australian yeast extract in art! |
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supplying the benefits |
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| From the perspective of a job description, my role - in addition to overseeing the creation of each issue of YeastBytes - is to talk up the importance of an assured, robust yeast supply process. Sexy or what! Regrettably though, the provision of fresh yeast from the laboratory to propagator is all too often perceived as an activity that requires little attention, support or importance. This approach is at best unfortunate and, at worst, commercially damaging! Like the snowball rolling down a snow covered hill, a small oversight, poor practice or a passed-over problem at the outset of yeast supply gets bigger and bigger as the yeast becomes established in production. So is this alarmist stuff? Is it really an issue that requires focussed attention within a Brewery, a global organisation, or through outsourcing to specialists like Cara? |
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| My answer? Well, there is nothing quite like the experience of yeast supply going wrong to win over the interested or convert the disinterested! In a previous life - as briefly touched upon in YeastBytes no.3 - I had the task of unravelling a yeast supply issue that had paralysed a major brewery. Then as now, phenolic lager was not part of the NPD programme, particularly in such awesome volumes. So this was a tricky problem to resolve and, once sorted, I had the job of ensuring it would never happen again. Mmmm so no pressure then! |
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Did you know |
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when you run out of paint ... |
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| I've always been interested in the way likes, dislikes, skills and talents partition in families. In YeastBytes No 2, I touched on the Marmite 'gene' and how three of us loved it but my wife and son hate it. When it comes to artistic ability in the Quain household, the partition is 4 to 1. Regrettably I'm the 'one' (as in rubbish) but the other four have talent creating all sorts of impressive stuff with different media. Whilst oil, acrylic, paint, paper and fabric are all part of their palette, the application of yeast extract has - so far - been limited to toast and sandwiches! |
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read more ... » |
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What's new at Cara? |
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Cara ?old boy? moves on and up |
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Former Cara Technology consultant and trainer John Brauer has been appointed as the next Secretary General of the European Brewery Convention. He takes up the post at the beginning of October. John has also recently co-authored ?Brewery Problems Solved? - with Bill Simpson of Cara Technology and Andrew Downes of the South African Breweries. It will be published by Woodhead Publishing in 2008. |
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International Brewing Convention 2007 |
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The Cara Technology team will be present at the International Brewing Industry Exhibition in Manchester, Tuesday 2nd October 2007 08.30 ? 18.00 hrs and
Wednesday 3rd October 2007 08.30 ? 17.30 hrs. You can find us on stand M12.
This is a great opportunity to ask any questions you have about our services and how we might help you deal with your brewery problems. We have a limited number of tickets available. These can be obtained, on a first come first served basis, from Hilary Flockhart. |
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Queen's Award for FlavorActiV |
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Hats off to our colleagues at Beer Taster Management specialists FlavorActiV who have won their second Queen's Award in three years. This time a Queen's Award for Innovation for their Taster Validation Scheme. |
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Read more here |
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freeze dying |
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| I have a lot of affection for BRI (aka Brewing Research International). I'm part of a small group of folk who have worked at Nutfield on two occasions - as far as I know nobody has managed three stints! My first appearance in the early 1970's, at what was then BIRF (the snappy 'Brewing Industry Research Foundation'), was characterised by black and white photographs of surprisingly well dressed people. In my case, a jacket, trousers and tie was the everyday dress code, as was dark luxuriant hair and a 32 inch waist - oh halcyon days! This was the time when 'best practice' was that precious production yeast strains were freeze dried prior to storage in the National Collection of Yeast Cultures (NCYC) held, at that time, at BIRF. |
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passport control |
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| You may have noticed but we don?t miss the chance to humanise yeast in YeastBytes. Reflecting on advances in yeast identification via snazzy molecular approaches triggered the thought that checking yeast ID is a bit like going through passport control. However there is one small point of difference! I could be wrong but I?m not convinced that Mr Yeast respectfully waits at the line and then steps forward, with a good intentioned smile whilst inwardly praying ?not me?! |
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the generation game |
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how does your media grow? |
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| The routine quality control of culture media is one of those necessities of microbiological laboratory life which should be done alongside calibrating pH meters, checking incubator temperatures and all the other minutia of Good Laboratory Practice. For some (!) it might not be the most interesting of topics and can be time consuming, but without carrying out these basic tests then how are you going to know if your media does the job for which it is intended? Is it fit for purpose, does it at least grow the bacteria or yeast you expect and inhibit the growth of those you don?t want? |
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Until next time ... |
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| So here in the UK after the wettest summer since records began, it's a little galling that autumn is hurtling towards us as if summer never really happened. Anyway the good news (honest!) is that with the drawing in of the day there will be lots more time for building YeastBytes No 5. Less time cutting the grass, standing reassuringly by a rather impressive barbecue (importantly made from first principles!) and (now it's stopped raining) watering the flower beds and vegetables. |
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| The next issue of YeastBytes in - whisper it - November will focus on (among other things) the joys of and developments in yeast propagation, what 'metabolic footprinting' can tell us about brewing yeasts and, in the customarily off the wall 'did you know' section, using yeast to sniff out explosives. |
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| Dr David Quain - Editor of YeastBytes, Associate Process Consultant, Cara Technology Ltd and Founder and Director of red.ts Ltd. |
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