Story about turning brewers yeast into multicellular organisms

[Athos56]

Found this article, sounds cool, thought I would share it here.

Multicellular Life Evolves in Laboratory | Wired Science | Wired.com

 

[flynavy03]

So if I wash and reuse a yeast cake, how many times can I use it before my beer comes crawling out of the carboy?

 

[Athos56]

Well, it looks like two months for multicellular evolution, I'd give it another month before its cloning you in a pod. What I wanted to know was how the beer tasted to those scientists...

 

[flynavy03]

Sounds like a plan. If it clones me, I can get more work done. Grocery bill might be an issue, though.

 

[Scooby_Brew]

I took my IPA slurry for a quick walk in the park today.

 

[GarageDweller]

Its alive! Its ALIIIIIIVEEE!!!

 

[Ethanfox]

Mutant yeast ... I wonder what properties it would provide for my brew.

 

[DregAddict]

Good story, but the results are highly debated. It is not completely known whether yeast were once multicellular and their genome may have retained many of those genes in unexpressed loci. So it may just be that this sample, instead of evolving to have an entirely new function(multicellularity), actually just reverted back to an ancient phenotype by undergoing a few simple mutations.

 

[Athos56]

Mutant yeast ... I wonder what properties it would provide for my brew.

Likely it would decide it likes the beer and drink it for you, then ask for a ride home...

Yeah, they still need to figure out whats going on, but I thought it was cool that they had cell specialization and juvenile stages. The juveniles are not allowed to convert sugar into alcohol....