The Crabtree Effect: A Regulatory System in Yeast

SUMMARY: When Saccharomyces cerevisiae is growing exponentially on glucose or fructose as carbon plus energy source, and in the presence of air, the glucose degradation proceeds mainly via aerobic fermentation. When the yeast is growing on mannose or galactose, degradation proceeds simultaneously via respiration and fermentation. This situation results from a repression of the of the respiratory enzymes synthesis by high fermentation rates. This regulatory system, called the “Crabtree effect”, consists actually of a repression of an energy source (respiration) by another energy source (fermentation). Various yeast strains were tested; the regulatory system was present in about 50% of them.