Effect of soil particle size on vine water status, leaf ABA content and berry quality in Nebbiolo grapes

Vines require proper light levels, temperature, and water availability, and climate change is modifying these factors, hampering yield and quality. Despite the large diversity of rootstocks, varieties, and clones, we still lack knowledge of their combined effects and potential role in a warmer and dryer future. Therefore, we aim to characterize some of the existing diversity of rootstocks and genotypes and their interaction at the eco-physiological level, combining stomatal conductance (gs) and chlorophyll a fluorescence analysis.

Global warming is accelerating the technological ripening of the grape, with a loss of acidity, which requires that vineyard management can delay ripening to avoid it. The source-sink relation is essential for grape ripening, since it affects the distribution of photosynthates and substances derived from plant metabolism. A work is proposed to know the response of the vineyard to the drastic reduction of the foliar surface by trim down the shoots in cv.

Grapevine varieties from South-America, commonly known as criollas, originated because of the natural crossbreeding of grapevine varieties brought by the Spaniards. The objective of this work was to evaluate the potential of some varieties to produce sparkling wines considering the effect of lees contact time. The following varieties were used: Moscatel Rosado, Criolla Chica, Pedro Gimenez, Blanca Oval, Canelón, and the European variety Chardonnay (control), planted in the ampelographic collection of EEA Mendoza INTA (Argentina). Pilot-scale vinifications were carried out to obtain the base wines, in 20 L glass containers. The second fermentation was performed through the traditional method.

The wine spoilage caused by Brettanomyces bruxellensis is one of the global concerns for winemakers. Detecting the presence of B. bruxellensis using routine laboratory culture techniques becomes challenging when cells enter the viable but not culturable (VBNC) state. This study aims to investigate the impact of p-coumaric acid (a volatile phenol precursor) and micronutrients on B. bruxellensis’ culturability, viability, and volatile phenol production under sulfite stress. In red wine, exposure to a high sulfite dose (100.00 mg L-1 potassium metabisulfite) resulted in immediate cell death, followed by a recovery of culturability after two weeks.

Grapevine pruning is one of the most important practices in the vineyards. Winegrowers use it to provide the vines the shape needed, or to maintain it once achieved, and also to balance vegetative growth and fruit production. In the last decades, careless pruning has been blamed, among other factors, as responsible of the vineyard decay that is been observed even in young vines. However, to our knowledge, there is a lack of systematic research trying to elucidate to which extent the pruning method used affects plant development or its susceptibility to grapevine trunk diseases (GTD). Within this context, the aim of this work is to study the influence of different pruning method strategies on the development of field-planted young vines.