The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has been considered for more than 20 years as a premier model organism for biological sciences, also being the main microorganism used in wide industrial applications, like alcoholic fermentation in the winemaking process. Grape juice is a challenging environment for S. cerevisiae, with nitrogen deficiencies impairing fermentation rate and yeast biomass production, causing stuck or sluggish fermentations, thus generating sizeable economic losses for wine industry. In the present review, we summarize some recent efforts in the search of causative genes that account for yeast adaptation to low nitrogen environments, specially focused in wine fermentation conditions. We start presenting a brief perspective of yeast nitrogen utilization under wine fermentative conditions, highlighting yeast preference for some nitrogen sources above others. Then, we give an outlook of S. cerevisiae genetic diversity studies, paying special attention to efforts in genome sequencing for population structure determination and presenting QTL mapping as a powerful tool for phenotype–genotype correlations. Finally, we do a recapitulation of S. cerevisiae natural diversity related to low nitrogen adaptation, specially showing how different studies have left in evidence the central role of the TORC1 signalling pathway in nitrogen utilization and positioned wild S. cerevisiae strains as a reservoir of beneficial alleles with potential industrial applications (e.g. improvement of industrial yeasts for wine production). More studies focused in disentangling the genetic bases of S. cerevisiae adaptation in wine fermentation will be key to determine the domestication effects over low nitrogen adaptation, as well as to definitely proof that wild S. cerevisiae strains have potential genetic determinants for better adaptation to low nitrogen conditions.

中文翻译：

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解开酿酒酵母氮消耗的遗传基础和葡萄酒发酵中对低氮环境的适应


20多年来，芽殖酵母酿酒酵母一直被认为是生物科学的首要模式生物，也是广泛工业应用（例如酿酒过程中的酒精发酵）的主要微生物。葡萄汁对酿酒酵母来说是一个充满挑战的环境，氮缺乏会损害发酵速率和酵母生物量的产生，导致发酵停滞或缓慢，从而给葡萄酒行业带来相当大的经济损失。在本综述中，我们总结了最近在寻找导致酵母适应低氮环境的致病基因方面所做的一些努力，特别是在葡萄酒发酵条件下。我们开始简要介绍葡萄酒发酵条件下酵母氮利用的情况，强调酵母对某些氮源的偏好高于其他氮源。然后，我们对酿酒酵母遗传多样性研究进行了展望，特别关注用于群体结构确定的基因组测序工作，并将 QTL 作图作为表型-基因型相关性的有力工具。最后，我们概述了与低氮适应相关的酿酒酵母自然多样性，特别展示了不同的研究如何证明TORC1信号通路在氮利用中的核心作用，并将野生酿酒酵母菌株定位为有益的储存库。具有潜在工业应用的等位基因（例如改进用于葡萄酒生产的工业酵母）。更多专注于解开酿酒酵母适应葡萄酒发酵的遗传基础的研究将是确定驯化对低氮适应的影响的关键，以及明确证明野生酿酒酵母的适应性。 酿酒酵母菌株具有潜在的遗传决定因素，可以更好地适应低氮条件。