OSU's got a hop on fermentation

University's rare fermentation science program will host

By: Nick Vardanega

Posted: 8/8/07

The various research facilities on the OSU campus contribute a multitude of information to OSU's body of knowledge in a wide variety subjects from climate change to computer engineering.

But for the last decade, OSU has been one of the few colleges in the United States on the cutting edge of a subject that, while overlooked, may be of great importance to college students all over the country: making better beer.

Housed in Wiegand Hall on the northern boundary of campus is the Pilot Plant Brewhouse containing a two-barrel, temperature controlled brewing system where researchers in OSU's fermentation science program produce and research beer.

"Our mission is to educate students in Oregon," said Tom Shellhammer, an associate professor in fermentation science. "[And] to disseminate information at professional meetings, published in scientific journals and in reports to the industry."

Fermentation science is an option in the department of food science and technology which is equipped with both an on-campus brewery and winery.

At the Pilot Plant Brewhouse barley, grown in greenhouses on campus, is crushed and mixed with heated water and later combined with hops from the nearby USDA hops farm to create any style of beer.

OSU is one of the only two universities in the country - the other being the University of California Davis - to offer this kind of academic program.

Shellhammer said that the type of hops used in any American beer product were probably developed at the USDA hops farm located on campus.

"We're kind of the ground zero of hops," he said.

As a result, OSU has been selected to host the first international symposium on hops, organized by the Master Brewers Association of America and the American Society of Brewing Chemists.

Thursday and Friday, over 140 brewmasters and scientists from 13 countries will be on campus attending talks and presenting research on how the different flavor, stability and bitterness characteristics of hops affect the taste of beer.

They will also tour the fermentation facilities and the hops farm.

Speakers will be from brewing companies and research institutes from both the United States and Europe.

Paul Hughes from Herriot-Watt University in Scotland, Dietmar Kaltmer from Germany and among others will speak tomorrow. Shellhammer said that Kaltmer, "wrote the hops Bible."

"On the beer side this is the first time that OSU has this sort of international focus," said Shellhammer, who has been with the program since 2001 and serves as a liaison between the university and the beer industry. Shellhammer also helped organize the conference.

"It's spectacular, I think it's a real tribute to what Tom [Shellhammer] has done with the program," said Jeff Clawson, the manager of the Pilot Plant who has been there since the program began in 1996.

"We've always served the local brewing industry ... but once Tom got here we really started working with the larger breweries and really bringing more exposure to the program and OSU."

The fermentation science program was started at OSU in 1996 with an endowment from Jim Bernau - president of Willamette Valley Vineyards as well as CEO of the Nor'Wester Brewing Company - to fund OSU's brewhouse and create a professorship dedicated to fermentation science.

"The brewing industry really kicked off in Oregon in the early 80s," Shellhammer said. "Right about the time it was peaking we got approached by Jim Bernau ... he saw a need for an educated workforce for both his winery and his brewery and he approached us and asked what it would take."

The brewhouse is strictly for research purposes, meaning none of the beer brewed there is sold or distributed anywhere else. And the beer is poured down the drain as soon as research on it is finished.

"It doesn't go home with students," Shellhammer said.

Research is done in a variety of ways. Sometimes ordinary consumers are brought in to taste test the beer, but more typically they use people who are highly trained in areas like hops flavor or aroma to sample and describe it.

The beer is also often time tested by chemists and microbiologists who use instruments to test how different physical or chemical changes affect flavor.

Shellhemmer - who himself is a brewing chemist - said that the fermentation science option requires so much knowledge of chemistry that upon completion students receive a minor in chemistry by default, based on the classes they have to take.

Many industry beer makers also use OSU's facilities for research.

"It's a good symbiotic relationship between the brewing industry and research community," said Karl Ockert, general manager for brewing operations at Bridgeport Brewing Company in Portland.

Ockert said that each summer Bridgeport takes two interns from OSU, and this year's OSU interns helped in developing two new seasonal craft beers.

Ockert is also helping to organize and put on the hops conference.

"I have the most important job of all, I'm the beer captain," Ockert said.

He will be responsible for "marshalling the forces" to distribute the beer provided by the various international, national and regional breweries that will be represented at the conference.

In addition to Bridgeport, several other people from area breweries will be in attendance including Red Hook from Seattle, Deschutes from Bend and Sierra Nevada from Chico, Calif.