Growth and Assimilation in Cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Abstract

The extent of assimilation of carbon from glucose, maltose and sucrose was detd. in actively growing cultures of S. cere-visiae in a synthetic medium. Assimilation was less than in washed suspensions and was shown to occur in 2 distinct phases; an aerobic fermentative assimilation followed by oxidative assimilation of ethyl alcohol and of other waste products of the primary phase. The nature of the sugar employed as carbon source influenced the extent of assimilation, a greater percentage of assimilation being observed from sucrose and technical maltose than from glucose. Evidence was obtained that the greater extent of assimilation from technical maltose than from C.P. maltose was due to the presence of an unknown growth factor in the technical material.