Anaerobiosis revisited: growth of Saccharomyces cerevisiae under extremely low oxygen availability

• Published in: Applied microbiology and biotechnology Vol. 102; no. 5; pp. 2101 - 2116
• Main Authors: da Costa, Bruno Labate Vale, Basso, Thiago Olitta, Raghavendran, Vijayendran, Gombert, Andreas Karoly
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.03.2018; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Anaerobic conditions; Anaerobic growth factors; Anaerobic microorganisms; Anaerobiosis; Baking yeast; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Bioreactors; Biotechnology; Butyl rubber; Cell culture; Chemostat cultivation; Ergosterol; Ethanol; Fatty acids; Gene expression; Growth; Growth factors; Health aspects; Industrial applications; Laboratories; Life Sciences; Microbial Genetics and Genomics; Microbiology; Microorganisms; Mini-Review; Nuclear fuels; Oxygen; Physiology; Reproducibility; Rubber; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Yeast; Yeasts; Anaerobiosis; Chemostat cultivation; Oxygen; Anaerobic growth factors; Saccharomyces cerevisiae
• ISSN: 0175-7598; 1432-0614; 1432-0614
• DOI: 10.1007/s00253-017-8732-4

The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae plays an important role in biotechnological applications, ranging from fuel ethanol to recombinant protein production. It is also a model organism for studies on cell physiology and genetic regulation. Its ability to grow under anaerobic conditions is of interest in many industrial applications. Unlike industrial bioreactors with their low surface area relative to volume, ensuring a complete anaerobic atmosphere during microbial cultivations in the laboratory is rather difficult. Tiny amounts of O 2 that enter the system can vastly influence product yields and microbial physiology. A common procedure in the laboratory is to sparge the culture vessel with ultrapure N 2 gas; together with the use of butyl rubber stoppers and norprene tubing, O 2 diffusion into the system can be strongly minimized. With insights from some studies conducted in our laboratory, we explore the question ‘how anaerobic is anaerobiosis?’. We briefly discuss the role of O 2 in non-respiratory pathways in S. cerevisiae and provide a systematic survey of the attempts made thus far to cultivate yeast under anaerobic conditions. We conclude that very few data exist on the physiology of S. cerevisiae under anaerobiosis in the absence of the anaerobic growth factors ergosterol and unsaturated fatty acids. Anaerobicity should be treated as a relative condition since complete anaerobiosis is hardly achievable in the laboratory. Ideally, researchers should provide all the details of their anaerobic set-up, to ensure reproducibility of results among different laboratories.