Integration of the AOC and terroir concepts by future professionals of the international wine sector

Disease-resistant hybrid grape cultivars (DRHGCs) are hybrids of Vitis vinifera varieties with other Vitis species, and they are endowed with greater resistance to specific fungal diseases, enabling a potential reduction in the application of pesticides in the vineyard.

If one considers as “physical or sensory attributes” of a wine its concentrations of alcohol and of other substances, it can be stated that another class of attributes exists

Among all pathologies that afflict grapevine, Downy Mildew (DM) is the most important. Generally controlled using Copper (Cu), recently European Commission confirmed its usage but limiting the maximum amount to 28 Kg per hectare in 7 years (Reg. EU 2018/1981).

One of the main consequences of global warming is the rise of the mean temperature. Thus, the heat summation by the plants begins sooner in the early spring, and by cumulating growing degree-days, phenological development tends to happen earlier. However, spring frost is still a recurrent phenomenon causing serious damages to buds and therefore, threatening the harvests of the winegrowers. The wind machine is a solution to protect fruit crops against spring frost that is increasingly used. It is composed of a 10-m mast with a blowing fan at its peak. By tapping into the strength of the nocturnal thermal inversion, it sweeps the crop by propelling warm air above to the ground. Thus, stratification is momentarily suppressed. Furthermore, the continuous action of the machine, alone or in synergy, or the addition of a heater allow the bud to be bathed in a warmer environment. Also, the punctual action of the tower’s warm gust reaches the bud directly at each rotation period. All these actions allow the bud to continuously warm up, but with different intensities and over a different period. Although there is evidence of the effectiveness of the wind machines, the thermal transfers involved in those mechanisms raise questions about their true nature. Field measurements based on ultrasonic anemometers and fast responding thermocouples complemented by laboratory measurements on a reduced scale model allow to characterize both the airflow produced by the wind machine and the local temperature in its vicinity. Those experiments were realized in the vineyard of Quincy, in the framework of the SICTAG project. In the future paper, we will detail the aeraulic characterization of the wind machine and the thermal effects resulting from it and we will focus on how the wind machine warms up the local atmosphere and enables to reduce the freezing risk.

The chemical behavior of anthocyanins is considerably affected even by slight pH variations with impor-tant implications for the winemaking as well as for the wine conservation