Microorganisms are tiny organisms that are invisible to the naked eye, and all kinds of microorganisms have been active on the earth for billions of years before the emergence of humans. They are also the closest "friends" of human beings, and human society is inseparable from their help at all times.
The formation of sake is the result of the ingenuity of microorganisms, and it is called "invisible brewer" in the industry, and the "cellar" is the "stage" for microorganisms to play in the sake brewing process. Recently, Wuliangye launched a series of videos entitled "TA Says: The Beauty of Living Cellars", which tells the mystery of "making good wine" in Wuliangye's ancient cellar pool in an ideological, inspiring and easy-to-understand popular science language.
The time and place are favorable, and a glass of five-grain wine is achieved
One side of the water and soil nourishes one side of the people, and one side phenology makes one side of wine. The microorganisms that can make high-quality liquor are not produced casually, but need an opportunity of "time, place, and people".
In the "time of day": Wuliangye was born in Yibin, the wine capital of China, near the golden wine-making belt at 30 degrees north latitude, and was praised by UNESCO and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the World as "the most suitable area for brewing high-quality pure distilled liquor at the same latitude on the earth". The water source, sunlight, temperature, humidity and so on all seem to provide unique natural ecological conditions for the growth of high-quality microorganisms.
In addition, Wuliangye liquor water is taken from the Minjiang River, which is 90 meters deep into the central channel of the Minjiang River and pumped out the ancient river water rich in minerals through a 400-meter pipeline.
In terms of "harmony": the traditional brewing technology of Wuliangye Liquor follows the ancient "Chen's Secret Recipe" and the five-character recipe of "planting, brewing, selecting, aging and blending" fine wine, and integrates the wisdom and practice of the winemaking craftsmen of the past dynasties to create the characteristic process of "one pole, three excellence, six originality and six fine brewing", which is a typical representative and fresh model of the traditional brewing skills of Chinese liquor. Wuliangye has also gathered a large number of masters of koji-making, wine-making, and blending...... They refine their craftsmanship, forge their souls, and continue to climb to the pinnacle of Chinese baijiu quality.
"Time, location, and people" constitute the irreproducible "Chinese taste" of Wuliangye, and it has also become an irreplaceable classic in the hearts of the Chinese people and a "Chinese business card" that floats the world.
The living Yuanming cellar pool is the source of the five grains of harmony
"The thousand-year-old cellar is ten thousand years old, and the wine must be old in the cellar."
The cellar is the core carrier of liquor fermentation and the most important cradle carrier for the growth of liquor microorganisms, which has a crucial impact on the quality and taste of liquor. The secret of Wuliangye's unique fragrance originates from Wuliangye's most valuable living heritage - the ancient cellar pools of the Yuan and Ming dynasties.
Wuliangye Yuanming Ancient Cellar Pond Group is composed of eight ancient wine-making workshops and hundreds of ancient cellar ponds, including Changfasheng, Lichuan Yong, Tingyuelou, Tianxifu, Liu Dingxing, Zhong Sanhe, Zhang Wanhe, Quan Hengchang, etc., which is the largest, most complete and longest continuous fermentation and use of the active ancient cellar pond group found in China so far. These living ancient cellar pools have been listed as a national tangible cultural heritage and are known as "living history".
As early as 1964, the Sichuan Provincial Cultural Relics Management Committee had investigated and identified the "Changfa Sheng" ancient wine shop. Since then, Wuliangye has carried out many archaeological explorations on ancient wineries such as "Lichuan Yong" and "Changfa Sheng", unearthed a number of relatively rich relics and relics, and won many honors such as provincial and national cultural relics protection units.
In 2020, the "Archaeological Wuliangye" project was launched, which lasted 18 months, with the participation of more than 100 archaeologists and more than 30 top experts in archaeology and the industry in China. This archaeology provides empirical evidence for the historical age of Wuliangye ancient cellar ponds to the Yuan Dynasty, and provides important clues for tracing the history of liquor brewing in Yibin and even southern China.
Wine is a product of spatial ecology and the precipitation of time. Wuliangye Laojiao Pond continues to brew, year after year, round after round, continuous feeding of grain to achieve the continuous domestication, screening and iteration of wine-making microorganisms, and finally form the most suitable for Wuliangye's wine-making needs, active in the regional environment, unique special micro-micro-biota, these special micro-micro-communities and brewing activities promote and improve each other, forming a unique micro-ecosystem, making Wuliangye more and more rich in fragrance, and achieving the strong fragrance of Wuliangye.
The "micro" knowledge in the cellar mud, the "scientific and technological background" of China's wine king
Cellar mud is the most important object of analysis for the study of microorganisms.
The price per gram of ancient cellar mud in the Yuanming live cellar pond of Wuliangye is higher than that of gold, and it is known as "sky-high mud". In 2005, a piece of ancient cellar mud in the ancient cellar pond of Wuliangye "Changfa Sheng" Winery was permanently collected by the National Museum of China, becoming the only "living cultural relic" in the museum's current collection.
It is reported that each gram of ancient cellar mud contains billions of functional microorganisms, and it is these rich microbial communities that ensure the quality of Wuliangye. The qualitative and quantitative study of such an "astronomical order" of microbial reaction activities determines the high starting point of the scientific and technological content of the wine industry.
Chen Lisheng, the founder of modern microbiology in mainland China, once said, "If anyone can thoroughly study the microorganisms of liquor, he can win the Nobel Prize." In order to thoroughly understand the types of caproic acid bacteria in the pit mud, Wuliangye and the team of Professor Xu Yan of Jiangnan University set up a joint research team to re-conduct scientific research from the source.
In 2022, the joint research team used the optimized cultivation and separation technology of acid-producing bacteria in cellar mud to isolate a number of unnamed new species. Among them, the "new microbial species" numbered "JNU-WLY1368", that is, the JNU-WLY1368 strain, found in the ancient cellar mud of Wuliangye, is an important representative strain of this new species.
"JNU-WLY1368 bacteria" has been proved to be one of the microorganisms that play a leading role in the old cellar mud species of strong flavor liquor in mainland China, and its emergence has solved the puzzle that has plagued mainland liquor researchers for more than half a century--the scientific classification of caproic acid bacteria in the main body of strong flavor liquor brewing, which is helpful to comprehensively uncover the scientific mystery of the complexity of the brewing system of strong flavor liquor. It is considered by industry insiders to be a double milestone event in the field of microbiology and the liquor industry, and it is a major discovery that can be written into the textbook of liquor.
So far, in conjunction with Jiangnan University, Wuliangye has discovered and published a series of typical microbial strains of liquor in the world. The four new strains discovered for the first time in the world are also named after Wuliangye. In addition to "Hexobacterium lactic acid" (JNU-WLY1368), Wuliangye has also successfully isolated Propiophilus propionate (JNU-WLY501), Clostridium cymbaligenes (WLY-B-L2) and Saccharomyces angustifolia (WLY-L-M-1) in the past two years, and related scientific research papers have frequently appeared in international professional authoritative journals. The results of the "Research on New Species of Characteristic Microorganisms in the Brewing System of Strong Aroma Liquor and Its Application" completed in cooperation with Jiangnan University have reached the international leading level.
In addition, Wuliangye has also set up a core strain resource bank for brewing, with a storage capacity of 100,000 backups and more than 400 kinds of strains, which is currently the largest enterprise strain bank in the mainland brewing industry. For the first time in the world, the flavor fingerprint of more than 3,000 compounds of Wuliangye was published, and a number of bioactive ingredients with functions such as promoting autophagy, antioxidant and delaying thrombosis were discovered, and the health attributes of Wuliangye were further scientifically confirmed.
Wuliangye also strives to establish and improve the integration and innovation system of production, education, research and application, and promote the transformation of scientific and technological achievements. There are 7 national innovation platforms and 6 provincial and ministerial innovation platforms, and the number of innovation platforms is leading in the industry. It has won 13 international leading level achievements, more than 20 scientific and technological progress awards at the provincial and ministerial level and above, more than 30 major scientific and technological innovation achievements, and more than 1,800 patents, leading the industry in the number of achievements.
Inheritance is the starting point of innovation, and innovation is the driving force of inheritance. The ancient industry of liquor is developing in the field of science with the difficulty of "making progress by one inch and making further progress". As a leading enterprise in the industry, Wuliangye adheres to the combination of tradition and innovation, makes great efforts around high-level scientific research, and empowers the high-quality development of enterprises with scientific and technological innovation, which will surely lead the industry to achieve a higher level, higher quality and more sustainable development.