Exploring the prevalence of esca-induced leaf symptoms in French vineyards and the role of climate: a national scale analysis

In a context of sustainable agriculture, “agroecological immunity” is an emerging concept to reduce the use of chemical pesticides to protect crops against pathogens. This alternative strategy aims to combine different levers including the use of “bio”solutions. These include biocontrol products, some of which being plant defense elicitors, as well as products authorized in organic farming such as copper or sulfur. In vineyards, depending on climate conditions, powdery and downy mildews can be devastating diseases.

Leaf removal in the fruit-zone has been employed to improve cluster light exposure and ventilation and therefore increase metabolite accumulation and reduce botrytis incidence in berries. When applied before flowering (early defoliation – ED), it can also decrease cluster compactness and regulate yield in high-yielding varieties. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of ED on the physiology and metabolism of Aragonez (syn. Tempranillo) berries along the ripening period. The experiment was set up in 2013 at a commercial vineyard located in the Lisbon winegrowing region.

Sparkling wine (SW) production entails a two-steps process where grape must undergoes a primary fermentation to produce a base wine (BW) which is then refermented to become a SW. This process allows for the development of a new physicochemical profile characterized by the presence of foam and a different organoleptic profile.

By dissecting the root system architecture (RSA) into its underpinning components (e.g. root emission, axial growth, radial growth, branching, root direction or tropism) and identifying the relationships between them, functional-structural 3D root models are promising tools for analyzing the diversity and complexity of root system phenotypes with Genotype × Environment interactions. The model parameters are assumed to be synthetic traits, less influenced by the environment, and consequently with less polygenic architectures than the integrative RSA traits they drive. Root models can serve as a basis for in silico development of root system ideotypes by highlighting the developmental processes and parameters that most likely influence RSA fitness.

The disruptive effect exerted by high-power ultrasound (US) on plant cell walls, natural barriers to the diffusion of compounds of interest during the maceration of red wines, is established as the reason behind the chromatic improvement that its treatment causes. However, sometimes this improvement is not observed, especially with short maceration times. The presence of a high quantity of suspended cell wall material, which formation is favored by the sonication, could be the cause of this lack of positive results since this cell wall material has a high affinity for phenolic compounds.