Preservation of lactic starter cultures

Abstract

© 2016 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC. Conventionally, lactic starter cultures are freshly prepared by the successive propagation of cells from a small amount of stock culture until a large volume of bulk inoculum with approximately 108-9 viable cells/ml is obtained. e bulk inoculum will be added to milk to get approximately 106-7 viable cells/ml of milk. Fermented milk plants may have their own culture collection for the preparation of stock cultures or purchase stock cultures from starter producing labs. is practice is used especially by plants, where they produce local special products and where the regular supply of stock cultures is easy. e successive propagation of starter cultures has disadvantages: (1) it is very laborious and labor intensive, (2) several stepwise propagations necessitate a high degree of production planning, (3) it has a high risk of bacterial contamination or phage infection, and (4) the repeated subculture carries a potential for the loss of some properties due to mutation and auto-selection.