Researchers from Cork say the origin of the world’s most popular beer may have come about by chance.
A team from UCC, working alongside German scientists, have uncovered the likely genesis and path to world dominance of the yeast responsible for producing lager.
The team believes the yeast came about as a result of the mixing and mating of two different yeast species.
Professor John Morrissey, from UCC's School of Microbiology, says the origins of lager yeast have been a mystery for some time.
"The most interesting thing we found was we identified the time and the place when lager yeast was born, when it originiated.
"We were able to establish that this almost certainly took place in the Munich Hofbrauhaus between 1602 and 1607.
"We knew that it was a hybrid species, when two different species mated - one of those is called Saccharomyces eubayanus, and the other is called Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
"What we didn't know was where those parents came from.
"We were able to establish that the Saccharomyces cerevisiae parent of lager yeast actually came from a brewery in a town called Schwarzach in norther eastern Bavaria."
