jim_reaper1066
Well-Known Member
I have always tracked my beer and wine fermentation using a hydrometer, however I want to take more precise measurements and not drop a few hundred bucks on a refractometer. Does anyone know if a spectrophotometer can be used to track the progression of fermentation in either beer/wine/mead? And if such nm wavelengths can be related back to sugar content? i.e. S.G.? I realize that several different measurements would have to be taken, OD660 nm for yeast cell turbidity, and possibly a spectral scan of different volumes of dissolved sugars in water to establish a background OD. Has anyone ever heard of something along these lines. Im considering taking small volume samples of my next batch of mead to track spectrophotomerically in the lab, it might be a fun experiment to track Hydrometer readings vs. Yeast cell turbidity vs. sugar absorbance.