Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 10, 2026

Novel Production Protocol for Small-scale Manufacture of Probiotic Fermented Foods
Published on: September 10, 2016
Quality control of fifteen probiotic products containing Saccharomyces boulardii
L M E Vanhee1, F Goemé, H J Nelis
1Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Microbiology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Aims:
The yeast Saccharomyces boulardii is used as a probiotic for the prevention and treatment of diarrhoea. In this study, the quality of 15 probiotic products containing S. boulardii was verified.
Methods And Results:
Using microsatellite typing, the identity of all Saccharomyces strains in the products was confirmed as S. boulardii. Additionally, solid-phase cytometry (SPC) and a plate method were used to enumerate S. boulardii cells. SPC was not only able to produce results more rapidly than plating (4h compared to 48h) but the cell counts obtained with SPC were significantly higher than the plate counts. Finally, we found that <1% of the S. boulardii cells survived 120min in gastric conditions and storage for 3months at 40°C with 75% relative humidity.
Conclusions:
We developed a SPC method for the quantification of viable S. boulardii cells in probiotics. Additionally, we demonstrated that gastric conditions and storage have a marked effect on the viability of the yeast cells.
Significance And Impact Of The Study:
To our knowledge, this is the first time SPC is used for the quality control of probiotics with S. boulardii. Additionally, we demonstrated the need for gastric protection and accurate storage.
Related Concept Videos
Probiotics
Microbes in Beverage Production
Microbes in the Production of Fermented Foods
Microbes in Food Production
Production of Alcohol
Biological Methods for Microbial Control
