HeadyKilowatt
Well-Known Member
We've all heard it and read it, many of us have said it ourselves- your infected beer will not hurt you, as nothing pathogenic can live in beer. But I have never seen any hard data to back this up.
Which is why I was exited to see a paper being given at a regional archaeology conference this weekend in which the researcher was investigating the old hypothesis that fermentation was used historically, and dating back to ancient times, to make dirty or stagnant water potable.
The researcher made two one-gallon batches of unhopped wort with an OG of 1.054, pitched an appropriate amount of yeast, and infected one batch with E. coli. Fermentation proceeded for six days. After fermentation, he conducted two tests (which I can't really describe- I'm an archaeologist, not a biologist) for the presence of the pathogen in the infected batch. Both tests came back negative. Fermentation had killed the E. coli, or at least prevented it from establishing itself and ceased its reproductive cycle such that the colony died.
I went for a beer with the researcher later and talked about the experiment and knocked around ideas for what was happening here (is it the alcohol that "killed" the pathogen or something else in the fermentation process? and did it really "kill" it, or just out-compete it?) and ideas for future experiments that could refine the data and allow for a clearer picture of what's happening.
Anyway, even though the results are preliminary, I'm excited to see some hard data backing up the idea that nothing harmful can survive in beer (not that I ever doubted it, but it is cool to see it backed up with experimental data). I encouraged the researcher to publish his data and get it into the brewing literature in addition to the archaeology/history world, so hopefully we can all see some of this info soon. Also, if anyone is aware of any other experiments on this phenomenon that have been conducted, please post them here and I can pass them on to the fellow doing the research.
Keep on homebrewing- you never know what's in the water!
Which is why I was exited to see a paper being given at a regional archaeology conference this weekend in which the researcher was investigating the old hypothesis that fermentation was used historically, and dating back to ancient times, to make dirty or stagnant water potable.
The researcher made two one-gallon batches of unhopped wort with an OG of 1.054, pitched an appropriate amount of yeast, and infected one batch with E. coli. Fermentation proceeded for six days. After fermentation, he conducted two tests (which I can't really describe- I'm an archaeologist, not a biologist) for the presence of the pathogen in the infected batch. Both tests came back negative. Fermentation had killed the E. coli, or at least prevented it from establishing itself and ceased its reproductive cycle such that the colony died.
I went for a beer with the researcher later and talked about the experiment and knocked around ideas for what was happening here (is it the alcohol that "killed" the pathogen or something else in the fermentation process? and did it really "kill" it, or just out-compete it?) and ideas for future experiments that could refine the data and allow for a clearer picture of what's happening.
Anyway, even though the results are preliminary, I'm excited to see some hard data backing up the idea that nothing harmful can survive in beer (not that I ever doubted it, but it is cool to see it backed up with experimental data). I encouraged the researcher to publish his data and get it into the brewing literature in addition to the archaeology/history world, so hopefully we can all see some of this info soon. Also, if anyone is aware of any other experiments on this phenomenon that have been conducted, please post them here and I can pass them on to the fellow doing the research.
Keep on homebrewing- you never know what's in the water!