FREE TERPENE RESPONSE OF ‘MOSCATO BIANCO’ VARIETY TO GRAPE COLD STORAGE

Abstract

Temperature control is crucial in wine production, starting from grape harvest to the bottled wine storage. Climate change and global warming affect the timing of grape ripening, and harvesting is often done during hot summer days, influencing berry integrity, secondary metabolites potential, enzyme and oxidation phenomena, and even fermentation kinetics. To curb this phenomenon, pre-fermentative cold storage can help preserve the grapes and possibly increase the concentration of key secondary metabolites.

In this study, the effect of grape pre-fermentative cold storage was assessed on the ‘Moscato bianco’ white grape cultivar, known for its varietal terpenes (65% of free terpenes represented by linalool and its derivatives) and widely used in Piedmont (Italy) to produce Asti DOCG wines. The study involved two experiments: a 12 h short-term storage under fresh (15 °C) and sunny outdoor (peak of 43 °C) conditions, and a medium-term storage under five different temperatures (5, 7, 12, 17, 19 °C) and durations (12, 24, 54, 84, 96 h), according to a Central Composite Design then evaluated using response-surface methodology (RSM). Berry skin break force mechanical property and juice physiochemical parameters were analyzed, as well as juice free terpene compounds using GC-MS.

In the short-term trial, after 4 and 8 h of storage the cooled sample showed a higher concentration of linalool, but at the end of the storage (12 h, when external temperature dropped to 25-20 °C after sunset), an opposite situation was found, possibly indicating a higher terpene solubilization in their thermotolerance defense role.

The medium-storage experiment indicated that the sum of the 13 detected terpenes in grape juice significantly decreased progressively after 75 h of storage, particularly in samples stored at the highest temperature tested (19 °C). However, the RSM model indicates that storage times shorter than 50 h contributed to higher terpenes, as well as the increase in storage temperature. The berry skin break force was not affected significantly by the treatments.

In conclusion, grape cold storage may offer several advantages in winemaking, but further studies are needed on this variety for assessing the best storage temperature and length conditions, as well as for the comparison between free and glycosidically-bound terpenes in juice and in the resulting wine. Acknowledgments. We thank Marco Rossetto and DENSO Thermal Systems (Poirino, Italy) for their support to this study.