Differentiating and grouping of oltrepo’ pavese environments according to grape maturation

L’area a “Denominazione di Origine Controllata Colli Euganei”, riconosciuta con Dpr 13 agosto 1969, è situata a sud-ovest della Provincia di Padova (fig. 1) ed è costituita da un sis­tema collinare di nuclei vulcanici evolutosi morfologicamente.

In a recent context where consumers pay an increasing attention to sustainability and eco-friendly aspects in the decision-making process, the use of the resistant varieties in the wine sector have returned to the attention. In this context, the use of mould-resistant grape varieties would be an opportunity for sparkling wine producers as it can reduced the pesticide utilization in grape management and hence production costs.
However, the use of the resistant varieties to produce the base wine may be strongly influenced due to its requirements for a particular balance between sugars and acidity to ensure the quality of the final product. In addition, the aromatic profile of base wine plays a crucial role in the perception of the quality of the sparkling wine.

Aim: A soil mapping methodology based on gamma-ray spectrometry and soil sampling has been applied for the first time in Burgundy. The purpose of this innovative high-resolution mapping is to delimit soil areas, to define elementary units of soil for terroir characterization and vineyard management. The added value of this integrated approach is a continuous geophysical mapping of the soil with an investigation depth of 60cm.

Climate change and harvest date decisions have led to the evolution of must quality over the last decades. Increases in must sugar concentrations are among the most obvious consequences, quantitatively. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is a robust and acid tolerant organism. These properties, its sugar to ethanol conversion rate and ethanol tolerance make it the ideal production organism for wine fermentations. Unfortunately, high sugar concentrations may affect S. cerevisiae and lead to growth inhibition or yeast lysis, and cause sluggish or stuck fermentations. Even sublethal conditions cause a hyperosmotic stress response in S. cerevisiae which leads to increased formation of fermentation by-products, including acetic acid, which may exceed legal limits in some wines.

Aims: The aims of this study were to (1) detect alterations in the reflectance spectra of vines with fungal diseases, (2) map these alterations, and (3) determine the best wavelengths which may be used as early indicators of fungal diseases in vines.