Yeast Ferments Sucrose and Dextrose Equally

Abstract

Many industries have sought to determine what factors combined with yeast will have the highest fermentation rate, and consequently the most ethanol output. Table sugar and artificial sweeteners have varying effects on the amount of ethanol that is produced from yeast, so we wanted to find out what kind of sugar fermented yeast the most. We used table sugar (sucrose), dextrose, and two sweeteners containing dextrose (Sweet Life and Splenda). There was no significant difference between the different sugars fermentation. Consequently, our hypothesis that sucrose fermentation would produce the most ethanol was not supported.