YEAST CARBON BASE *

Yeasts are unicellular fungi. They are easily differentiated from most bacteria because of their relatively larger size and morphological features. Yeasts are used for synthesizing certain fats, vitamins and proteins from simple sugars and ammonium nitrogen. They are also known to cause plant and animal diseases, spoil food and bring about deterioration of textiles and other materials. Yeast Carbon Base, developed by Wickerham, is used for the classification of yeasts on the basis of their ability to assimilate various nitrogen compounds. The nitrogen assimilation ability is tested by adding various nitrogen sources such as ammonium sulphate, urea, potassium nitrate, asparagine, peptone.

for classi?cation of yeasts based on their ability to assimilate nitrogen compounds