Abstract

The microbial diversity of the surface of a commercial red-smear cheese, Livarot cheese, sold on the retail market was studied using culture-dependent and independent approaches. Forty yeasts and 40 bacteria from the cheese surface were collected, dereplicated using single-strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP) analysis and identified using rRNA gene sequencing for the culture-dependent approach. The culture-independent approach involved cloning and sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene and SSCP analysis from total DNA extracted from the cheese. The most dominant bacteria were Microbacterium gubbeenense, Leucobacter komagatae and Gram-negative bacteria from the Gamma-Proteobacteria class. Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) analysis was also used to study the cheese microbial diversity with class-level and specific rRNA-targeted probes for bacteria and yeasts, respectively. FISH analysis confirmed that Gamma-Proteobacteria were important microorganisms in this cheese. Four specific FISH probes targeting the dominant yeasts present in the cheese, Candida catenulata, Candida intermedia, Geotrichum spp. and Yarrowia lipolytica, were also designed and evaluated. These probes allowed the detection of these yeasts directly in cheese. The use of the rRNA gene-based approach combined with FISH analysis was useful to investigate the diversity of a surface microbial consortium from cheese.