Controlling Wine Oxidation: Effects of pH on Key Reaction Rates

The chemistry of wine oxidation is captured in the reactions between the oxidation products, mostly reactive electrophiles, with other wine constituents. An understanding of both components and their reactions can lead to ideas and techniques to control and mitigate or enhance these reactions to allow for the desired development of the wine. Current investigations are yielding much useful information about oxidation reactions in wine.

Viticulture in Greece is the oldest, but in recent years there has been a reduction of areas intended for the production of wine products. The article contains data on viticulture in Greece. Over time, the land of Greek vineyards is fluctuating. There is a trend towards a decrease in areas in connection with the quota of products from the EU.

Grapevine yield and fruit quality are two major drivers of input allocation and, ultimately, revenue for grape producers. Because yield and fruit quality vary substantially from year-to-year and within a single block, opportunities exist for optimization via precision management activities that could lead to more profitable and sustainable grape production. Here, we review recent advances in the techniques and technology used to measure, estimate, and forecast grapevine yield and fruit quality. First, we discuss direct “measurement” of yield and quality (i.e. ground-truth data generation), with an emphasis on potential for scalability and automation. Second, we discuss technology and techniques that do not directly measure yield and quality, but use correlated measurements for their estimation.

Identification and characterisation of terroirs depends on knowledge of environmental parameters, functioning of the grapevine and characteristics of the final product. A network of plots of Sauvignon blanc was delimited in commercial vineyards in proximity to weather stations at 20 localities and their viticultural and oenological response was monitored for a period of seven years. These experimental plots were further characterised with respect to climate, soil and topography.

More frequent and extreme temperatures and droughts pose challenges to the wine sector in Mediterranean Europe. Soil is crucial to sustain the equilibrium of ecosystems, economic growth and people’s prosperity worldwide. In viticulture, soils are a major component of the terroir and do influence vine’s growth, yield and berry composition. Soil temperature (ST) affects soil´s physical, chemical and biological processes and also crop growth. The impact of ST becomes even stronger when dealing with row crops such as grapevine, when considering the increased exposition to radiation. However, the impact of ST on crop performance remains poorly described, especially for extreme climatic conditions.