Using RFLP-mtDNA for the rapid monitoring of the dominant inoculated yeast strain in industrial wine fermentations

The analysis of restriction fragment length polymorphism of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA-RFLP) has been applied as a test to monitor the abundance of the starter yeast strain during industrial wine fermentations without previous isolation of yeast colonies. For white wine fermentations, we performed a rapid assay consisting in taking a sample of fermenting must, purifying the DNA from harvested cells, and obtaining the restriction patterns by digestion with the endonuclease HinfI. The same protocol, but adding an overnight cultivation step before DNA purification, was also applied to red wine fermentations. The results were compared with those obtained from the subsequent characterisation of strains, for the same samples, by analysis of the electrophoretic karyotype of isolated yeast colonies. In all cases, when the inoculated strain was dominant within the yeast population, the rapid assay anticipated the result by showing the coincidence between the restriction profiles obtained from both total cells and the inoculated strain. The results were obtained at 11 or 23 h after sampling for white- or red-wine fermentations respectively. This method allows a rapid intervention of the wine-producer if the presence of the inoculated yeasts has suffered a sudden decrease in any phase of the fermentation process.