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mutations

I changed 1970s to 1930s based on web research such as https://books.google.ca/books?id=VKlHKIvrogUC&pg=PA706&lpg=PA706&dq=microorganisms+could+be+mutated+with+physical+and+chemical+treatments&source=bl&ots=r58Hy2VPaO&sig=HJ73BJRZvJ_VzO3Mf9H4LyDIopQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj1t5ew-NXZAhUr4YMKHfdWBaAQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=microorganisms%20could%20be%20mutated%20with%20physical%20and%20chemical%20treatments&f=false

I also removed the ad for BioTork - natural selection of yeasts especially for wine is centuries old - not a modern invention. Other approaches to advancing the fermentation industry has been done by companies such as BioTork, a biotechnology company that naturally evolves microorganisms to improve fermentation processes. This approach differs from the more popular genetic modification, which has become the current industry standard. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.103.184.76 (talk) 19:50, 5 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Problems with opening paragraph. What kind of fermentation is this article about?

The opening paragraph seems to be strictly defining fermentation in terms of the biochemical definition of anaerobic fermentation. However, this is contradicted by the fist subsection, which includes both anaerobic and aerobic fermentation, and the broader definitions of fermentation in food processing where fermentation is any process involving microorganisms which transforms a foodstuff in a desirable way. I propose that the opening paragraph be re-written to better reflect the multiple definitions of the word "fermentation." Thoughts?

Saberus (talk) 08:28, 26 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

it would be great if you could provide a balanced introduction to this topic, because the term is widely used and many readers are seeking a general understanding. The catch to some extent, is that fermentation may have some very specialized meanings that, if pushed, are not net helpful. Thanking you in advance.--Smokefoot (talk) 00:03, 27 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I took a crack at it. Saberus (talk) 06:41, 27 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good. Thanks! RockMagnetist (DCO visiting scholar) (talk) 16:04, 2 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Science Communication

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 5 January 2022 and 4 April 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jakh8640 (article contribs).

Wiki Education assignment: The Microbiology of College Life

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 23 January 2023 and 12 May 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): AVV26CU (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Yp337 (talk) 20:14, 12 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Use of "In this Essay"

In the final sentence of the first paragraph of the Post 1930s section it says: "In this essay, we will explore the key developments in fermentation technology since the 1930s and the impact they have had on the global market for fermented products."

is that supposed to be there? looks like a sloppy copy & paste job. 72.39.82.248 (talk) 23:16, 12 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: EEB 4611-5611-Biogeochemical Processes

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 19 January 2025 and 4 May 2025. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Hhdvorak (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Nguy4986, Sarah.jaco, Sepolitsch.

— Assignment last updated by Sepolitsch (talk) 12:12, 11 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Anaerobic glycolysis

It's difficult to explain the difference between anaerobic glycolysis and fermentation. Anaerobic glycolysis is the general term that applies to all organisms that can convert glucose to ethanol or lactate. Fermentation is a related term that came mostly from the industrial processes.

When referring to the production of lactate in human tissues, we use anaerobic glycolysis instead of fermentation but that doesn't mean that the term "anaerobic glycolysis" is restricted to humans or multicellular animals. Yeast and bacteria also carry out anaerobic glycolysis.

We probably should have merged "Fermentation" with "Anaerobic glycolysis" rather than the other way around. Genome42 (talk) 21:43, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I know, Fermentation is commonly the name used by most biologists for the metabolic process, and Anaerobic Glycolysis is the term used by physicians specifically to describe the occurrence of lactate formation in animal cells. (Since when was "fermentation" strictly an industyl/production terminolog, not a biological process/chemistry terminology?)y The term "Anaerobic Glycolysis" would imply that there even is such a thing as "Aerobic Glycolysis"; there isn't, and glycolysis (the pathway itself) is still just the same thing, regardless whether the metabolic context was fermentative, anaerobic, or aerobic. The term "anaerobic glycolysis" would be redundant since glycolysis was never Aerobic to begin with anyway, it's just a series of catabolic reactions breaking down sugar molecules (hence glyco-lysis); "aerobic" would refer to the electron transport chain of bacteria and mitochondria, where it actually involves oxygen.

By the way, lactic acid and lactate are pretty much the same thing; lactate is just the conjugate base and is normally the form lactic acid takes inside cells. But yeah, the subsection should be renamed Lactate. CheckNineEight (talk) 06:44, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Is aerobic glycolysis denial some sort of conspiracy theory or political movement? I ask that because I'm trying to reconcile your insistence that glycolysis is inherently anaerobic with all the papers written about aerobic glycolysis available through Google Scholar. Largoplazo (talk) 11:15, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

You're getting it wrong. It's not that it's "inherently anaerobic", it's just that the term "(an)aerobic" need not apply. The process of anaerobic glycolysis is what we call Fermentation; really, they're just synonymous, I think. We're trying to avoid redundancies here, not denying AnGly's existence, that's why we merged the articles. CheckNineEight (talk) 12:11, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

You'd written Removed "(also called anaerobic glycolysis)" as that would imply there is such a thing as "aerobic glycolysis"; the term is invalid and The term "Anaerobic Glycolysis" would imply that there even is such a thing as "Aerobic Glycolysis"; there isn't. The term is not invalid, there is such a thing as aerobic glycolysis, and you did deny its existence. Now you're denying your denial. Largoplazo (talk) 12:38, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@CheckNineEight: I don't think the terms "fermentation" and "anaerobic glycolysis" are exactly synonymous in the scientific literature. Almost nobody refers to the production of lactate in muscle as "fermentation." However, scientists do sometimes refer to the production of ethanol in yeast and the production of lactate in bacteria as "anaerobic glycolysis."

Thus, it seems to me that anaerobic glycolysis is the more general term and fermentation is more restrictive.

The distinction between aerobic glycolysis and anaerobic glycolysis is based on the fate of NADH. If the electrons in NADH are passed on to the electron transport chain then that's aerobic glycolysis but if the NADH is used to reduce pyruvate to lactate or ethanol then it's anaerobic glycolysis. Genome42 (talk) 16:08, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If we're talking about the fate of NADH, then that is beyond Glycolisis; at that point, we're talking about cellular respiration. We should not confuse Cellular Respiration for Glycolysis; when you say "aerobic glycolysis", what you really mean to say is "aerobic respiration".

Again, glycolysis is glycolisis! There's no distinction between "aerobic" and "anaerobic" if we're referring specifically to just glycolysis; those words were meant to be qualifiers, they're not intended to be names of distinct processes.

Almost nobody refers to the production of lactate in muscle as "fermentation."

That's the point! We have the term anaerobic glycolisis specifically for that (because we're special or something like that, idunno). That's why we also have a paragraph in this article stating "Anaerobic glycolysis is a related term used to describe the occurrence of fermentation ..."

Also (and @Largoplazo, you could use to read this paragraph too): just because there are hundreds of Google Scholar results that mentions "aerobic glycolysis", that doesn't necessarily mean it's a valid term or that it is some distinct process, or that there was an (unanimous) agreement with (the usage of) the term. One journal on the first page of the search results defines aerobic glycolysis as "nonoxidative metabolism of glucose despite the presence of abundant oxygen";^[1] so that implies the process was anaerobic anyway (and also non-respiratory), with phrases like "despite ... abundant oxygen" and "non-oxidative". How is this mutually exclusive from Fermentation, then? What makes "anaerobic glycolysis" by that logic? Was the prefix "aerobic" merely there to refer to the abundance of oxygen? Another one of the results puts aerobic glycolysis in "scare quotes", and refers to it as a phenomenon (not pathway nor metabolic process).^[2] This is about semantics, not denial!

You've got to pay attention to what you're getting on Google Scholar, because not all of them are scientific journals; some of them could be reports, or textbooks – which oftentimes could be outdated in most topics of science, even with (relatively) recent publishings (reprints and such). Also make sure that what you're getting is not outdated or superseded by more recent findings.

CheckNineEight (talk) 02:31, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have no idea whether or how it's mutually exclusive from fermentation. I have made zero comments concerning that so I don't know why you're bringing it up in response to me.

I could understand if it were pointed out that whether it suffices to explain that glycolysis is involved in fermentation without getting into whether it's the aerobic or anaerobic variety or both. But what I'm paying attention to is one person trying to get me to believe that all those papers are written about a process that doesn't exist, about a distinction that doesn't exist, and that none of the scientists writing them know what they're talking about—while one unidentified person on Wikipedia does. Largoplazo (talk) 04:03, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@CheckNineEight: Lactate and lactic acid are not "pretty much the same thing." Yes, it's true that lactate is the conjugate base of lactic acid but the lactate dehydrogenase reaction does not produce a proton so the product is not lactic acid.

It's the same logic we use when identifying the end product of glycolysis as pyruvate and not pyruvic acid. Genome42 (talk) 16:16, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Goyal, Manu S.; Hawrylycz, Michael; Miller, Jeremy A.; Snyder, Abraham Z.; Raichle, Marcus E. (2014-01-07). "Aerobic Glycolysis in the Human Brain Is Associated with Development and Neotenous Gene Expression". Cell Metabolism. 19 (1): 49–57. doi:10.1016/j.cmet.2013.11.020. ISSN 1550-4131. PMID 24411938.
^ Schurr, Avital; Passarella, Salvatore (2022-01-13). "Aerobic Glycolysis: A DeOxymoron of (Neuro)Biology". Metabolites. 12 (1): 72. doi:10.3390/metabo12010072. ISSN 2218-1989. Archived from the original on 2025-06-07.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link)

Lactic acid vs. lactate

It's a common misconception that anaerobic glycolysis produces lactic acid. The actual product is lactate, NOT lactic acid. The reaction is catalyzed by Lactate dehydrogenase and if you check that article you can see that the product is lactate, not lactic acid.

The entire "Lactic acid" section needs to be renamed and re-written, including the equations. This is not the place to get into the controversial aspects of human physiology and whether there can be additional protons produced when lactate is produced. We just need to present the correct biochemistry and the correct equations.

(The figures are correct.) Genome42 (talk) 22:15, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's worth noting that NADH is one of the products of glycolysis. In most organisms, NADH can be oxidized by the electron transport chain to regenerate NAD+ that can be used in glycolysis. In many organisms, especially eukaryotes, oxygen is the ultimate electron acceptor.

In the absence of oxygen, NADH may accumulate and this inhibits glycolysis and the production of ATP. The main purpose of fermentation is to oxidize NADH in the alcohol dehydrogenase or lactate dehydrogenase reactions. This allows glycolysis to continue.

See Alcohol dehydrogenase where it says, "The purpose of this latter step is the regeneration of NAD+, so that the energy-generating glycolysis can continue." Genome42 (talk) 22:04, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

[1] Goyal, Manu S.; Hawrylycz, Michael; Miller, Jeremy A.; Snyder, Abraham Z.; Raichle, Marcus E. (2014-01-07). "Aerobic Glycolysis in the Human Brain Is Associated with Development and Neotenous Gene Expression". Cell Metabolism. 19 (1): 49–57. doi:10.1016/j.cmet.2013.11.020. ISSN 1550-4131. PMID 24411938.

[2] Schurr, Avital; Passarella, Salvatore (2022-01-13). "Aerobic Glycolysis: A DeOxymoron of (Neuro)Biology". Metabolites. 12 (1): 72. doi:10.3390/metabo12010072. ISSN 2218-1989. Archived from the original on 2025-06-07.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: unflagged free DOI (link)

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