Simulated Fermentation of Strong-Flavor Baijiu through Functional Microbial Combination to Realize the Stable Synthesis of Important Flavor Chemicals

Abstract

The solid-state fermentation of Baijiu is complicated by the co-fermentation of many microorganisms. The instability of the composition and abundance of the microorganisms in the fermentation process leads to fluctuations of product quality, which is one of the bottleneck problems faced by the Strong-flavor Baijiu industry. In this study, we established a combination of functional microorganisms for the stable fermentation of the main flavor compounds of Baijiu, including medium and long-chain fatty acid ethyl esters such as hexanoic acid, ethyl ester; butanoic acid, ethyl ester; octanoic acid, ethyl ester; acetic acid, ethyl ester; 9,12-octadecadienoic acid, ethyl ester; and decanoic acid, ethyl ester in the fermented grains. Our study investigated the effects of microbial combinations on the fermentation from three aspects: microbial composition, microbial interactions, and microbial association with flavor compounds. The results showed that the added functional microorganisms (<i>Lactobacillus</i>, <i>Clostridium</i>, <i>Caproiciproducens</i>, <i>Saccharomyces</i>, and <i>Aspergillus</i>) became the dominant species in the fermentation system and formed positive interactions with other microorganisms, while the negative interactions between microorganisms were significantly reduced in the fermentation systems that contained both Daqu and functional microorganisms. The redundancy analysis showed that the functional microorganisms (<i>Lactobacillus</i>, <i>Saccharomyces</i>, <i>Clostridium</i>, <i>Cloacibacterium</i>, <i>Chaenothecopsis</i>, <i>Anaerosporobacter</i>, and <i>Sporolactobacillus</i>) showed strong positive correlations with the main flavor compounds (hexanoic acid, ethyl ester; lactic acid, ethyl ester; butanoic acid, ethyl ester; acetic acid, ethyl ester; and octanoic acid, ethyl ester). These results indicated that it was feasible to produce Baijiu with a functional microbial combination, and that this could promote stable Baijiu production.