Coping with extreme climatic events: some lessons from recent work on grapevine under heat peak

In 2022, wine production was estimated at around 260 million hl. This high production rate implies to generate a large amount of by-products, which include grape pomace, grape stalks and wine lees. It is estimated that processing 100 tons of grapes leads to ~ 22 tons of by-products from which ~ 6 tons are lees [1]. Wine lees are a sludge-looking material mostly made of dead and living yeast cells, yeast debris and other particles that precipitate at the bottom of wine tanks after alcoholic fermentation. Unlike grape pomace or grape stalks, few strategies have been proposed for the recovery and valorisation of wine less [2].

The trial aims to improve the protection and management of the soil, the well-being of the plant and the quality of production in the wine supply chain organic and biodynamic, using an innovative product “ZEOWINE” resulting from the composting of waste of the wine and zeolite supply chain.

Addressing the opportunities and challenges of genomics methods in grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) requires the development of a comprehensive and accurate reference genome and annotation. We aimed to create a new gene annotation for the PN40024 grapevine reference genome by integrating the highly accurate and complete T2T assembly and the manually curated PN40024.v4 annotation. Here, we present a novel workflow to enhance the annotation of the T2T genome by incorporating past community input found in PN40024.v4. The pipeline’s containerization will improve the workflow’s reproducibility and flexibility, facilitating its inclusion as a shared workflow on the Grapedia portal, the grapevine genomics encyclopedia.

High concentration of sugars in grapes and alcohol in wines is one of the consequences of climate change on viticulture production in several wine-growing regions. In order to investigate the possibilities of adaptation of vineyard management practices aimed to reduce the accumulation of sugar during the maturation phase without reducing the accumulation of anthocyanins in grapes, a study with severe shoot trimming, shoot thinning, cluster thinning and date of harvest was conducted on Merlot variety in Istria region (Croatia), under the Mediterranean climate. Four factors which may affect grape maturation and its composition at harvest were investigated in a two-years experiment; severe shoot trimming applied at veraison when >80% of berries changed colour (in comparison to untreated control), shoot thinning (0 and 30%), cluster thinning (0 and 30%), and the date of harvest (early and standard harvest dates). Shoot thinning had no significant impact on berry composition, despite the obtained reduction in yield per vine. Lower Brix in grapes were obtained with earlier harvest date and if no cluster thinning was applied, although at the same time a reduction in the concentration of anthocyanins in berries was observed in these treatments. On the other hand, if severe shoot trimming was applied when >80% of berries changed colour, a reduction of Brix was obtained without a negative impact on berry anthocyanins concentration. We conclude that in cases when undesirably high sugar concentrations at harvest are expected, severe shoot trimming at 80% veraison may effectively be used in order to obtain moderate sugar concentration in berries together with the adequate phenolic composition.

To study the copigmentation between different wine flavonols (myricetin, quercetin, kaempferol, isorhamnetin and syringetin 3-O-glucosides) and malvidin