Study of Two Pools of Glycogen in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and their Role in Fermentation Performance

Glycogen in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is present in two pools as cell wall bound and intracellular glycogen. The content of the cell wall bound glycogen was found to be almost three times higher than the intracellular glycogen. The content varied with the sugar concentration in the medium and an optimum value of 22.11 mg glycogen/g yeast was observed for the cell wall bound glycogen, while it was 7 mg/g yeast for the intracellular glycogen at a 12% medium sugar content. The two pools also varied with fermentation time reaching an optimal value at 36 h of fermentation. The cell wall bound glycogen was reduced by 85% during the first three hours after pitching, when sugar uptake was minimal and started to accumulate when almost 50% of the medium sugar was utilized. It was the cell wall bound glycogen that correlated with fermentation performance. Cells grown in 8% sugar content and rich in cell wall bound glycogen, when pitched into a 1% sugar medium showed an enhancement in ethanol content by 21%. The depletion of glycogen also affected fermentation performance.