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Predominance of Tetragenococcus halophilus as the cause of sugar thick juice degradation.

Justé A, Lievens B, Klingeberg M, Michiels CW, Marsh TL, Willems KA

Department of Microbial and Molecular Systems, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Centre for Food and Microbial Technology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium.

The industrial storage of sugar thick juice was simulated on a laboratory scale. Terminal Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (T-RFLP) analysis and the application of Clone Libraries in parallel with classical microbiology were used to study the bacterial diversity and all revealed a dominance (>99%) of Tetragenococcus halophilus during storage. The degradation of thick juice correlated with the appearance of L-lactic acid and high concentrations of T. halophilus. In addition, pure cultures of T. halophilus induced degradation of sterile thick juice. A specific PCR was developed to detect T. halophilus and industrial thick juice samples from Belgium, Germany and France all contained T. halophilus, suggesting a consistent association of this organism with thick juice. T. halophilus has been known only as a halophile thus far, and this report is the first to show an association of this organism with a sugar-rich environment.

Published 21 January 2008 in Food Microbiol, 25(2): 413-21.
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