Effect of ozone treatments in wine production of young and short-term aged white wines: destructive and non-destructive evaluation of main quality attributes

Abstract

The main aim of WiSSaTech project (PRIN P2022LXY3A), supported by Italian Ministero dell’Università e della Ricerca and NextGenerationEU program, is to investigate eco-friendly and safe alternatives to sulphur dioxide (SO₂) in wine production. Three treatments were compared on two Italian white wines produced from grapes cv. Fiano and Vermentino as follow: by ozone treatment of grapes and cellar equipment either alone (O₃) [1], or used into the Purovino^® method [2], (PV), and by conventional use of SO₂. All analyses were carried out on the obtained wines (T0), after accelerated aging at 35 °C for one week (T1), and after six months of conventional aging at 18 °C (T6). Non-destructive analyses were performed on the wine samples through NIR-AOTF [3] and E-nose [4] measurements together with destructive ones, FT-NIR detected and associated with the main oeno-chemical parameters, with detailed polyphenols analysed by HPLC-HRMS [5], and VOCs [6]. Results coming from both analytical approaches were subjected to chemometric analyses with the aim to appreciate combinate behaviours of wine samples with respect to the employed grape variety, the vinification process, and the timing of the wine aging. PLS-DA modelling performed on NIR data revealed that Vermentino wine samples exhibit a good classification performance (96%) based on the ageing time of sampling (T0, T1, and T6), otherwise observed as lower in Fiano wines (74%). Statistical performances were reduced when single wine samples (O₃, PV, and SO₂) were considered as discriminative variables of classification (47% and 63% for Fiano and Vermentino wines, respectively). PLS-DA computed on E-nose data lead to similar results, showing a discrimination among T0, T1 and T6 (92%, and 76% for Vermentino and Fiano, respectively), regardless the single wine samples associated with the treatments. Conversely, the segregation among these last looked less evident (50%, and 41% for Vermentino e Fiano, respectively), being probably affected by an overlapping of the samples at T6. PCA computation performed on destructive data revealed a clear sample segregation between T0 and T6 times, for both the variety and the treatments. A significant correlation was found about the stability of the wines between accelerated aging (T1) and T6, based on the DE. Wine samples with no added sulphites showed the lower stability, particularly in Fiano, due to the highest catechin index values and Cu⁺⁺ concentrations.

References

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[2] Mencarelli, F., Catelli, C. (2013). Process for the Treatment and the Winemaking of Grapes. Italy Patent No. PCT/IB2012/000036.

[3] Antolini, A., Forniti, R., Modesti, M., Bellincontro, A., Catelli, C., Mencarelli, F. (2020). Ozone: Sci. Eng. 43(3), 254-262.

[4] Martínez-García, Rafael, et al. (2021). Food Chem. 334: 127574.

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[6] Slaghenaufi, D., Ugliano, M. (2018). Front. Chem., 6, 66.