Haplotype-Resolved genome assembly of the Microvine

Aim: The regulation of the vegetative-reproductive balance of a vineyard is a critical aspect for the quality of grapes. Early leaf removal, generally applied before the phenological stage of flowering, is mainly used as a technique to control yield and improve grape health, aimed at increasing the quality of the wine.

This study aimed to determine mineral composition in red wine obtained from cv. Teran (Vitis vinifera L.), autochtonous Croatian grape variety. Six different vinification treatments, including the control treatment (7-day standard maceration), were performed to study the effects of: 48-hour pre-fermentative mash cooling (8 °C) followed by prolonged post-fermentative maceration of 13 days (C15), 28 days (C30), and saignée technique (juice runoff) proceeded with prolonged post-fermentative maceration of 13 days (CS15); and effect of 48-hour heating (50 °C) followed by prolonged post-fermentative maceration of 13 days (H15) and 28 days (H30) on macro- and microelements in wine.

Grapevine is a crop of great economic importance for several countries. The intensification of grapevine production has mostly been sustained by the increasing use of water resources at the expense of the environmental water balance. Moreover, in the last decades, climate change and the consequent expansion of drought have further compromised water availability, making current agricultural systems even more fragile both ecologically and economically. Recently, many research groups have highlighted the important role of endophytes in facilitating plant growth under optimal or stressful conditions. Within the framework of the PRIMA project, we aim to investigate the possible exploitation of the natural endophyte biodiversity as a sustainable tool to make grapevine plants more resilient to water deficit environmental conditions.

The Languedoc-Roussillon wineries are facing a decline in wine yields particularly PGI yields due to many factors. Climate change is just ones, but is expected to increase in the future. There is also structurally a large heterogeneity of yield profiles among terroirs, varieties and strategies. This work investigates the link between yield, competitiveness and resilience to explore how resilient winegrowers have been in the recent past. To this end two approaches have been combined; (i) an accountancy database analysis at estate scale and (ii) municipality level competitiveness analysis. A new resilience indicator that characterizes the capacity of an estate to absorb yield variation is also defined. The FADN database between 2000 and 2018 of ex-Languedoc-Roussillon (France) and other data are used to analyse the current situation and the past evolution of competitiveness and resilience by type of estate (type of farm: PGI and/or PDO & type of commercialization: bulk and/or bottles). The net margin, which defines competitiveness, is not correlated to yield for all types but depends on the type of commercialization and the level of specialisation. The resilience indicator shows that the net margin of estates specialized in PGI is particularly sensitive to yield declines. We also show that price evolutions seem to compensate the effect of yield losses for the majority of types. Municipality scale analysis shows the links between local pedoclimate, yield, commercialization strategies and price. Overlapping a PDO with a PGI does not always increase a municipality’s PGI competitiveness. It is difficult to make links between causes and effects due to the complexity of the wine production system. Production diversification may be a solution. Resorting to the two level of analysis helps resolving the data gap that is necessary to explore the links between yield and economic performance of the wine estates in the long term.

The geology of the Western Cape testifies to the former existence of a late Precambrian supercontinent, its fragmentation, the closure of an ocean between the South African and South American continental precursors (Kalahari and Rio de la Plata cratons), the accumulation of marine sediments and limestones, and their compression during a collision between these cratons