New plant protein extracts as fining agents for red wines

Albariño is a white cultivar that has been recently promoted in Uruguay due to its ability to maintain high berry quality even in adverse climate conditions during ripening. This study aims to assess the effect of different topographic conditions on Albariño agronomic behavior and oenological potential.

Brandy de Jerez (BJ) is a spirit drink made exclusively from spirits and wine distillates and is characterized by the use of casks for aging that previously contained Sherries. The quality and sensory complexity of BJ depend on the raw materials and some factors: grape variety, conditions during processing the wine and its distillation, as well as the aging in the cask. Therefore, the original compounds of the grapes from which it comes are of great interest being in most cases the Airén variety. Their relationship with the quality of the musts and the wines obtained from them has been studied (1) and varies each year of harvest depending on the weather conditions (2).

Climate change, with rise in temperatures, is leading to an advance in the dates of phenological stages, with a loss in quality of the grape final product. Therefore, the understanding of the genetic determinants driving the phenological stages of flowering, veraison and the interval between them, represents a target for the development of grapevine’s cultivar adapted to the changing environment.
Here we conducted a GWA study to identify SNPs significantly associated to flowering time, veraison time and to the interval among them. A germplasm collection (CREA-VE in Susegana, Treviso, Italy) including 649 grapevine’s cultivar representing 365 unique genotypes was considered.

Viral diseases are reported to cause several detrimental effects on grapevine. Among them, leafroll, due to single or mixed infection of GLRaV1 and GLRaV3, and rugose wood, associated to GVA, are considered the most widespread and dangerous.

Biodiversity conservation and restoration are essential for guarantee the provision of ecosystem services associated to vineyard agroecosystem such as climate regulation trough carbon sequestration and control of pests and diseases. Most of published research dealing with the complexity of the vineyard agroecosystems emphasizes the necessity of innovative approaches, including the integration of information at different temporal and spatial scales and development of systemic analysis based on modelling. A biodiversity survey was conducted in the Franciacorta wine-growing area (Lombardy, Italy), one of the most important Italian wine-growing regions for sparkling wine production, considering a portion of the territory of 112 ha. The area was divided into several Environmental Units (EUs), defined as a whole vineyard or portion of vineyard homogenous in terms of four agronomic characteristics: planting year, planting density, cultivar, and training system. In each EU a set of compartments was identified and characterised by specific variables. The compartments are meteorology, morphology (altitude, slope, aspect, row orientation, and solar irradiance), ecological infrastructures and management. The landscape surrounding EU was also characterised in terms of land-use in a buffer zone of 500 m. For each component a specific methodology was identified and applied. Different statistical approaches were used to evaluate the method to integrate the information related to different compartments within the EU and related to the buffer zone. These approaches were also preliminarily evaluated for their ability to describe the contribution of biodiversity and landscape components to ecosystem services. This methodological exploration provides useful indication for the development of a fully systemic approach to structural and functional biodiversity in vineyard agroecosystems, contributing to promote a multifunctional perspective for the all wine-growing sector.