‘The awesome power of yeast’
Ian Macreadie A * and Sudip Dhakal AA School of Science, RMIT University, Bundoora, Vic. 3083, Australia.
Ian Macreadie has a 45-year history of yeast genetics. He was a research scientist at CSIRO for 24 years and then taught at RMIT University until 2020. He is currently an Honorary Professor of RMIT University. He is Editor-in-Chief of Microbiology Australia. |
Sudip Dhakal is a PhD researcher and a tutor/instructor at the School of Science, RMIT University, whose research focuses on investigating therapeutic strategies against Alzheimer’s disease using yeast models. |
Microbiology Australia 43(1) 19-21 https://doi.org/10.1071/MA22007
Submitted: 15 January 2022 Accepted: 25 February 2022 Published: 11 April 2022
© 2022 The Author(s) (or their employer(s)). Published by CSIRO Publishing on behalf of the ASM. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND)
Abstract
Yeast is one of the most useful microorganisms in society. Aside from the well known traditional uses in beer, wine and bread making, yeast is currently providing new opportunities for our society. This article examines some of those new opportunities which include using yeast as a model organism, yeast as a cell factory for valuable proteins, including vaccines and new therapeutics, and yeast as a very convenient tool for teaching.
Keywords: ageing research, cancer research, drug discovery, gene engineering, mitochondrial function, Nobel prizes, teaching, yeast-derived vaccines.
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