Beer and Proteomics

A team from the Polytechnic Institute of Milan is the latest group to try to characterize the beer proteome, reports DiscoveryNews. The researchers led by Pier Giorgio Righetti took samples from an Italian Splügen beer and pulled out the proteins to be analyzed by mass spec. They report in the Journal of Proteome Research that they found proteins from 20 different barley protein families and two maize proteins as well as 40 Saccharomyces cerevisiae proteins, one from S. bayanus, and one from S. pastorianus. "This opens up a completely new horizon in beer analysis in general, and also in the analysis of any beverage," Righetti tells DiscoveryNews. "We are now analyzing a lot of other beverages and finding a lot of surprising things that producers don't know are in their beverages."