AUTHOR=Kang Jiamu , Hu Yunan , Ding Ziyuan , Ye Li , Li Haoran , Cheng Jun , Fan Lin , Zhao Hu , Han Beizhong , Zheng Xiaowei 

TITLE=Deciphering the Shifts in Microbial Community Diversity From Material Pretreatment to Saccharification Process of Fuyu-Flavor Baijiu

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=12

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2021.705967

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2021.705967

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>The microbiota of the pretreatment phase is crucial to the assembly of the microbial community in the saccharification of <italic>fuyu</italic>-flavor <italic>baijiu</italic>. This study investigates the shifts in microbial community diversity from the pretreatment of raw materials to the end of saccharification. High-throughput sequencing reveals that <italic>Lactobacillus</italic>, <italic>Weissella</italic>, and <italic>Bacillus</italic> in the bacterial community and <italic>Rhizopus</italic>, <italic>Candida</italic>, <italic>Pichia</italic>, and <italic>Aspergillus</italic> in the fungal community are predominant during raw material pretreatment and saccharification processes. Also, 11 bacterial genera, including <italic>Bacillus</italic>, <italic>Lactobacillus</italic>, <italic>Leuconostoc</italic>, <italic>Weissella</italic>, <italic>Lactococcus</italic>, and <italic>Acetobacter</italic>, and eight yeast genera, including <italic>Candida</italic>, <italic>Pichia</italic>, <italic>Saccharomyces</italic>, and <italic>Wickerhamomyces</italic>, were isolated from the initial saccharification stage by culture-dependent approaches. Sourcetracker analysis indicates that the cooling grains and rice husks were the main contributors to the bacterial community composition of the saccharification process, and <italic>Qu</italic> was the main contributor to the shaping of the fungal community structure during the saccharification process. Abundance variation of the predictive functional profiles of microbial communities encoding for key enzymes involved in pyruvate metabolism, starch and sucrose metabolism, and glycolysis/gluconeogenesis during the pretreatment and saccharification phases were inferred by PICRUSt2 analysis. The results of this study will be utilized to produce consistently high-quality <italic>fuyu</italic>-flavor <italic>baijiu</italic> via better controlling the shaping of microbial community structures during the pretreatment and fermentation processes.</p>