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Brewing & Winemaking

Reliable Yeast Counting for Brewing and Winemaking

Yeast concentration and viability are essential in fermentation processes such as beer brewing and winemaking, influencing flavor, aroma, alcohol yield, and overall quality.

The NucleoCounter® NC-203™ offers fast, reliable yeast counting, enabling winemakers and brewers to monitor yeast performance and make informed decisions during propagation, pitching, fermentation monitoring, and quality control.

Bearded man examining newly brewed beer in a brewery

One-Step Yeast Count and Viability with NC 203™

To count yeast cells, you lyse and count the cells using an AO stain for the total cell count. For the dead cell count, you stain the cells with DAPI and count them.

The NC 203™ enables fast, one-step yeast count and viability analysis. By combining PI Cassette™ technology with brightfield imaging, the system simplifies the workflow, minimizes handling, and delivers accurate, reproducible results in just 30 seconds.
The brightfield channel ensures accurate yeast cell identification, even in complex fermentation samples with debris, particles, or substrate aggregates. At the same time, the PI fluorescent dye within the cassette selectively stains dead cells by binding to their DNA once mixed with the sample.
This dual approach provides precise and consistent viability measurements, across haploid and diploid budding yeast, haploid fission yeast, and allotetraploid strains.
With its cassette-based sampling and fixed-focus design, the NC 203™ reduces variability associated with manual counting methods, reduces operator bias, and improves overall precision. Additionally, the system analyzes a larger effective sample volume compared to traditional hemocytometers, ensuring statistically robust and reliable results.

Optimized Workflow and Data Handling

• High-resolution image visualization
• Wide counting range: 5 × 10⁴ – 1 × 10⁷ cells/mL
• Variation: CV below 3 % at 1x 106 cells/mL
• Inclusion of dilution factor in the analysis (no further calculations!)
• Advanced analysis parameters: cell diameter, debris count
• Intuitive data browsing
• Export of results in multiple file formats
• Remote operations without a connected computer.
This allows breweries and wineries to easily document fermentation data, track yeast count over time, and integrate results into their existing data management systems.

Scientist inserting Via2-Cassette™ into the NucleoCounter® NC-202™

Applications Across Fermentation Industries

Beyond beer and wine production, yeast-based processes analyzed with the NC‑203™ include:

  • Kombucha, kefir, kvass, and other fermented beverages
  • Nutritional products such as probiotics, yeast extracts, and vitamins
  • Industrial fermentation processes, including bioethanol production

Accurate yeast monitoring supports consistent fermentation performance, improved yields, and reduced batch-to-batch variability across all these applications.

 

Counting Yeast with NucleoCounter® NC-202™

While NucleoCounter NC-203 is our recommended system for yeast counting, NucleoCounter® NC 202™ also supports yeast analysis using cassette-based sampling technology.

It relies on single-use Via2‑Cassettes™ with preloaded AO and DAPI dyes to differentiate total and non‑viable yeast cell populations. Compared to the NC-203™, the NC-202™ requires a two-step protocol for viability estimation: first, calculate the total cell count in lysed cells; second, to calculate viability.