How sensor technologies combined with artificial intelligence increase the efficiency in grapevine breeding (research): current developments and future perspectives

Grape pomace (GP) is a winemaking by-product particularly rich in (poly)phenols and dietary fiber, which are the main active compounds responsible for its health-promoting effects. GP-derived products have been proposed to manage cardiovascular risk factors, including endothelial dysfunction, inflammation, hypertension, hyperglycemia, and obesity. Studies on the potential impact of GP on gut health are much more recent. However, it is suggested that, to some extent, this activity of GP as a cardiometabolic health-promoting ingredient would begin in the gastrointestinal tract as GP components (i.e., (poly)phenols and fiber) undergo extensive catabolism, mainly by the action of the intestinal microbiota, that gives rise to low-molecular-weight bioactive compounds that can be absorbed and utilized by the body.

Agroecology is an integrated approach that simultaneously applies ecological and social concepts and principles to redesign and manage food and agricultural systems, promoting agroecosystems with the necessary biological, socio-economic, and institutional diversity and alignment to support greater efficiency. Thus, several studies have been carried out at promoting the adoption of more agroecological practices among farmers and a wider audience concerning soil conservation and health maintenance.

Despite their significant impact on wine quality and stability, colloids in red wine remain relatively under-researched. A series of studies, developed in the context of the d-wines project, aimed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the structure, composition, and formation mechanisms of red wine colloids by studying monovarietal wines from 10 of the most significant Italian red grape varieties. Starting from the idea that proteins, polysaccharides, and tannins should be involved in colloid formation, 110 monovarietal red wines were analysed for these components, revealing high inter- and intra-varietal diversity [1].

In viticulture, a warming climate can have a very significant impact on grapevine development and therefore on the quality and characteristics of wines across different spatial scales, ranging from global to local. In order to adapt wine-growing to climate change, global climate models can be used to define future scenarios, but only at the scale of major wine regions. Despite the huge progress made over the last ten years in terms of the spatial resolution of climate models (now downscaled to a few square kilometres), they are not yet sufficiently precise to account for the local climate variability associated with such parameters as local topography, in spite of these parameters being decisive for vine and wine characteristics. This study describes a method to downscale future climate scenarios to vineyard scale. Networks of data loggers have been used to collect air temperature at canopy level in the Waipara winegrowing region (New Zealand) over five growing seasons. These measurements allow the creation of fine-scale geostatistical models and maps of temperature (at 100 m resolution) for the growing season. In order to model climate change at pilot site scale, these geostatistical models have been combined with regional climate change predictions for the periods 2031-2050 and 2081-2100 based on the RCP8.5 climate change scenario. The integration of local climate variability with regionalized climate change simulations allows assessment of the impacts of climate change at the vineyard scale. The improved knowledge gained using this methodology results from the increased horizontal resolution that better addresses the concerns of winegrowers. The results provide the local winegrowers with information necessary to understand current processes, as well as historical and future viticulture trends at the scale of their site, thereby facilitating decisions about future response strategies.

Over the past two decades, climate change has contributed to an increase in sugar content in grape must, and consequently, in the ethanol levels of wines.