The value of electrophoretic fingerprinting and karyotyping in wine yeast breeding programmes

Electrophoretic banding patterns of total soluble cell proteins, DNA restriction fragments and chromosomal DNA were used to characterise ten strains of Saccharomyces cerevisiae used for commercial production of wine. These fingerprinting procedures provided unique profiles for all the different yeast strains and can therefore be used to identify and control industrial strains. Furthermore, the protein profiles, restriction fragments banding patterns and electrophoretic karyotyping by contour clamped homogeneous electric field electrophoresis (CHEF), were valuable to differentiate hybrid and parental strains in yeast breeding programmes. Hybrid strains, with desirable oenological properties, were obtained by mass spore-cell mating between a heterothallic killer yeast and two homothallic sensitive strains and all were shown to have unique DNA fingerprints and electrophoretic karyotypes.