Member Article

Natural selection for North East brewers

The organisers of Newcastle ScienceFest 09 have had a beer brewed to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin.

February 12th marks the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, and staff from Newcastle’s Centre for Life wanted to mark the occasion with a commemorative beer. The Centre teamed up with the Darwin Brewery in Sunderland to produce the pale ale, which has been brewed with ingredients selected to highlight Darwin’s legacy.

Linda Conlon, Chief Executive of the Centre and Director of the Newcastle ScienceFest, said: “What better vehicle to engage the public in some of the practical implications of Darwin’s work?

“Beer is an excellent example of both natural selection and selective breeding. Since the days of the first primitive beers, brewers have selected and modified hops and barleys and chosen from evolving strains of yeasts to produce the best tasting ales and beers.”

An initial brew of 3000 bottles will be on sale throughout the region.

Dr Keith Thomas from the Darwin Brewery said: “Traditional beers are very flexible foods, mixing flavours from their different ingredients and changing subtly as drinkers evolve their tastes. There are thousands of strains of brewing yeast producing many varieties of beer.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .