Reduced bunch compactness in a clone of Tempranillo associates with a complex reciprocal translocation detected by long-read sequencing genomics

Synthetic pesticides are widely used in viticulture to ensure steady harvest quality and quantity. Fungicides are primarily used to control grapevine diseases but insecticides and herbicides are likewise used. Pesticide residues in viticultural areas currently represent a strong societal concern, but may also affect different trophic chains in such areas. In this project we wish to analyse honeybees collected from hives placed in different vineyards, their natural predator (the invasive hornet Vespa velutina), as well as the honey, grape berries, and wines produced.

Currently, the main goal of agriculture is to promote the resilience of agricultural systems in a sustainable way through the improvement of use efficiency of farm resources, increasing crop yield and quality under climate change conditions. This last is expected to drastically modify plant growth, with possible negative effects, especially in arid and semi-arid regions of Europe on the viticultural sector. In this context, the monitoring of spatial behavior of grapevine during the growing season represents an opportunity to improve the plant management, winegrowers’ incomes, and to preserve the environmental health, but it has additional costs for the farmer. Nowadays, UAS equipped with a VIS-NIR multispectral camera (blue, green, red, red-edge, and NIR) represents a good and relatively cheap solution to assess plant status spatial information (by means of a limited set of spectral vegetation indices), representing important support in precision agriculture management during the growing season. While differences between UAS-based multispectral imagery and point-based spectroscopy are well discussed in the literature, their impact on plant status estimation by vegetation indices is not completely investigated in depth. The aim of this study was to assess the performance level of UAS-based multispectral (5 bands across 450-800nm spectral region with a spatial resolution of 5cm) imagery, reconstructed high-resolution satellite (Sentinel-2A) multispectral imagery (13 bands across 400-2500 nm with spatial resolution of <2 m) through Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) approach, and point-based field spectroscopy (collecting 600 wavelengths across 400-1000 nm spectral region with a surface footprint of 1-2 cm) in a plant status estimation application, and then, using Bayesian regularization artificial neural network for leaf chlorophyll content (LCC) and plant water status (LWP) prediction. The test site is a Greco vineyard of southern Italy, where detailed and precise records on soil and atmosphere systems, in-vivo plant monitoring of eco-physiological parameters have been conducted.

AIM: Valpolicella is a renowned Italian wine-producing region (Paronetto, 1981). Wines produced in its different sub-regions are anecdotally believed to be aromatically different, although there is no systematic study addressing the chemical bases of such diversity

Merlot grapevine is the second wine cultivar most planted in the world and especially in the Bordeaux wine region. This cultivar has many advantages in producing high quality wine; however, in the last decade, climate change has increased the sugar concentration in berries at harvest and shortened the maturation cycle. If this has been up to now a great opportunity to improve wine quality profile, we are touching the tipping point. High sugar concentration at harvest induces high alcool content in wine which can negatively impact wine quality. There are many viticultural and oenological practices possible to limit this effect. In this study we focus on plant material through intra-varietal diversity of Merlot cultivar.

Port wine is a fortified wine exclusively produced in the Douro Appellation (Portugal) under very specific conditions resulting from natural and human factors. Its intrinsic aroma characteristics are modulated upon a network of factors, such as the terroir, varieties and winemaking procedures that include a wide set of steps, namely the fortification with grape spirit (ca. 77% v/v ethanol).