Electro-stimulation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae wine yeasts by Pulsed Electric Field and its effect on fermentation performance

The batch fermentation process, inoculated by pulsed electric field (PEF) treated wine yeasts (S. cerevisiae Actiflore F33), was studied. PEF treatment was applied to the aqueous yeast suspensions (0.12 % wt.) at the electric field strengths of E=100 and 6000 V/cm using the same pulse protocol (number of pulses of n=1000, pulse duration of ti=100 mks, and pulse repetition time of dt=100 ms). Electro-stimulation was confirmed by the observed growth of electrical conductivity of suspensions. The fermentation was running at 30{deg}C for 150 hours in an incubator with synchronic agitation. The obtained results clearly evidence the positive impact of PEF treatment on the batch fermentation process. Electro-stimulation resulted in improvement of such process characteristics as mass losses, consumption of soluble matter content ({deg}Brix) and synthesis of proteins. It also resulted in a noticeable acceleration of consumption of sugars at the initial stage of fermentation in the lag phase. At the end of the lag phase (t=40 hours), consumption of fructose in samples with electrically activated inocula exceeded fructose consumption in samples with control inocula by 2.33 times when it was activated at E=100 V/cm and by 3.98 times after treatment at E=6000 V/cm. At the end of the log phase (120 hours of fermentation), 30% mass reduction was reached in samples with PEF-treated inocula (E=6000 V/cm), whereas the same mass reduction of the control sample required approximately, 20 hours of extra fermentation. The possible mechanisms of electro-stimulation are also discussed in details.