Wild yeast isolation by middle school students reveals features of populations residing on North American oaks

Features of the natural life cycle of the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae were crucial to its domestication as a laboratory experimental model, especially the ability to maintain stable haploid clones and cross them at will to combine alleles via meiosis. Stable haploidy results from mutation...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:G3 : genes - genomes - genetics 2024-11
Main Authors: Yeager, Randi, Heasley, Lydia R, Baker, Nolan, Shrivastava, Vatsal, Woodman, Julie, McMurray, Michael A
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:Features of the natural life cycle of the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae were crucial to its domestication as a laboratory experimental model, especially the ability to maintain stable haploid clones and cross them at will to combine alleles via meiosis. Stable haploidy results from mutations in HO, which encodes an endonuclease required for haploid-specific mating-type switching. Previous studies found an unexpected diversity of HO alleles among natural isolates within a small geographic area. We developed a hands-on field and laboratory activity for middle school students in Denver, Colorado, USA to isolate wild yeast from oak bark, identify species via DNA sequencing, and sequence HO from S. cerevisiae isolates. We find limited HO diversity in North American oak isolates, pointing to efficient, continuous dispersal across the continent. By contrast, we isolated the "dairy yeast", Kluyveromyces lactis, from a tree
ISSN:2160-1836
2160-1836
DOI:10.1093/g3journal/jkae270