Influence of pedoclimatic factors during berry ripening in Burgundy

The wine industry is currently shifting toward more sustainable production systems. There are many reasons for this as the interest of people over climate change and, consequently the wine consumer’s choice toward organic and biodynamic, reduced carbon-footprint, vegan and other environmentally friendly wines. While the viticultural effects of biodynamic and organic practices on wine grapes have been investigated, there is a lack in literature on the general effect on the final quality of wine

Climate change is a great challenge for the environment and affects the wine industry as well. Sunburn damage of sensitive grapes increase with severe heat periods. Besides significant loss of yield sunburn, modifies sensory properties of the wines and may cause climate-related off-flavours. To initiate sunburn in a controlled way, in 2021 sunburn was directly induced in the vineyard with the GrapeBurner device, exposing grapes of the varieties Riesling and Pinot Blanc with UV and IR radiation. This device was first assembled by Kai Müller of the university in Geisenheim and consists of a carriage with 6 UV/IR lamps. A 15 min irradiation was applied in early September at 60°Oe. Due to the colder season in 2021 the grapes were not harmed by previous sunburn damage.

The consequences of the global climate change in the vitiviniculture are revealed as a gap between phenolic and technological grape maturities, higher grape sugar concentration that leads to high wine alcohols levels, lower acidities and high pH values, among others. The unbalanced phenolic maturity caused in this scenario leads to harsh astringency and to instable colour of wines. Previous studies have reported that the addition of yeast mannoproteins (MPs) to wines may have positive effects on these two organoleptic properties due to their capability to interact with wine polyphenols [1]; however, studies about the effect of the pH on these interactions have not been carried out so far.

Viticulture needs for spatial and temporal information are increasing to improve vineyard management, especially concerning water efficiency. Remote sensing, particularly from satellites, can be a powerful tool to assess vineyard characteristics such as vigor or water status in space-time. In this study, we use Landsat 8, an American Earth observation satellite with six bands from the visible (VIS) to the Short-Wave Infrared (SWIR) domains with 30m spatial resolution and two thermal bands with 100m spatial resolution.

Aims: The aim of the study was to investigate whether organic or biodynamic management have a long-term impact on 1) the microbial biomass and enzymatic activity in the soil, 2) the soil microbial community, 3) flying as well as soil living arthropods and associated fungi.