SALEM -- The Oregon Senate approved a bill establishing brewer’s yeast as Oregon’s official state microbe Thursday.

In April the House unanimously approved

, which puts saccharomyces cerevisiae in the same company as the beaver and western meadowlark as official Oregon lifeforms. The Senate approved the measure in a 28-2 vote.

Concurrent resolutions don't need the governor's signature, so the senate vote set the state microbe designation into law.

Oregon is the first state to establish an official microbe.

the state’s official microbe passed the House but didn’t get a vote in the Senate before the legislature adjourned in earlier this month. A 2010 effort in Wisconsin to name a state microbe also failed to pass both chambers.

--Christian Gaston