You better take a seat for this. Hangover-free wine, potentially the thing that could make or break us, is now a possibility in the near future. Yeah, imagine drinking glass after yummy, delicious glass, and then bottle after yummy delicious bottle (I mean, wine counts as fruit right?) and not waking up the next day feeling like you want to smash your head in with a an empty bottle.

Researchers from the University of Illinois published a study in the journal “Applied and Environmental Microbiology” outlining their technique for changing the genetics of yeast – which in itself might be exciting for some, but certainly not for this writer… until the paper mentions that this technique could be used not only make wine healthier but also make wine that doesn’t give you a hangover!

Shit just got interesting!

“Fermented foods–such as beer, wine, and bread–are made with polyploid strains of yeast, which means they contain multiple copies of genes in the genome. Until now, it’s been very difficult to do genetic engineering in polyploid strains because if you altered a gene in one copy of the genome, an unaltered copy would correct the one that had been changed,” said Yong-Su Jin, a U of I associate professor of microbial genomics and principal investigator in the Energy Biosciences Institute.

With a tool that acts as a “genome knife” scientists are now able to reduce the elements in wine that cause hangovers. And not only that, they’re also able to increase the amount of resveratrol – a healthful component found in wine – in a variety of wine by 10 times or more.

“But we could also add metabolic pathways to introduce bioactive compounds from other foods, such as ginseng, into the wine yeast. Or we could put resveratrol-producing pathways into yeast strains used for beer, kefir, cheese, kimchee, or pickles–any food that uses yeast fermentation in its production.“

I mean, this is the dream ya’ll! If When this happens, I’m going to count wine as my juice of the day and that will pretty much be the only thing I will drink. I’m sure I’m not the only one! If this sounds in any way kind of messing with genetics well don’t worry.

Adam H. Callaghan from Eater’s reports:

If this process sounds a bit Monsanto-esque, Jin believes it should actually quell some concerns about GMOs, specifically the worry about microbes developing a tolerance for antibiotics. ”Scientists have had to use antibiotic markers to indicate the spot of genetic alteration in an organism, and many persons objected to their use in foods because of the danger of developing antibiotic resistance. With the genome knife, we can cut the genome very precisely and efficiently so we don’t have to use antibiotic markers to confirm a genetic event.”

Also, WINE!