Physiological aspects of growth and recombinant DNA stability in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Despite the fact that plasmid stability in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is influenced by both genetical and physiological parameters most attention has been focused on the former. Physiological factors affecting the stability of plasmids have been poorly characterized despite the need for such information in order to optimize the use of S. cerevisiae as a host for recombinant protein production processes. The physiology of wild type S. cerevisiae differs considerably when grown using different cultivation techniques. A limited amount of phenomenological data has been reported concerning plasmid instability effects under these different conditions and in this article these have been collected together with the intention of providing an overview to instability effects and to try and propose reasons as to how the physiological response to different growth conditions can be manifested as stability/instability effects.