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Geochemical fingerprints of “Prosecco” wine based on major and trace elements

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Abstract

The terroir can be defined as interactive ecosystem that includes climate, geology, soil and grapevine, and it is used to explain the hierarchy of high quality of wine. In order to understand the terroir functions, it is necessary to analyse the interactions among the geology, soil and wine. To define a geochemical fingerprint, the relationship between geochemistry of vineyard soil and chemical composition of wine from Veneto Italian Region was studied. The vineyards tested belonged to four distinct wineries located in the Veneto alluvial plain, included in the Controlled Designation of Origin (DOC) area of Prosecco. We investigated the relationship between major and trace elements in soil and their concentrations in Prosecco wine according to geographical origin. The detection of chemical composition in soil and wine were analysed by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, and data were elaborated by nonparametric test and multivariate statistics Linear Discrimination Analysis. The geochemical and statistical analyses allowed to discriminate the vineyard soils according to geo-lithological characteristics of each area and to identify the geochemical “Prosecco” fingerprints, useful against fraudulent use of DOC wine labels.

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Acknowledgements

The authors owe thanks to Mr. Renzo Tassinari for technical advice and experimental support, Dr. Milvia Chicca for useful suggestions, and Mr. Salvatore Cavaleri for elaboration of geological maps. The authors also wish to thank Mr. Luigi Sansone and the personnel of Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA) for their support in the sampling campaign. This study was funded by the Centro Regionale per la Viticoltura, l’Enologia e la Grappa (Conegliano, Treviso), project 2014-09-WLIVVV.

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  1. Department of Physics and Earth Sciences, University of Ferrara, Via Saragat 1, 44121, Ferrara, Italy

    Salvatore Pepi & Carmela Vaccaro

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  1. Salvatore Pepi
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  2. Carmela Vaccaro
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Correspondence to Carmela Vaccaro.

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Pepi, S., Vaccaro, C. Geochemical fingerprints of “Prosecco” wine based on major and trace elements. Environ Geochem Health 40, 833–847 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10653-017-0029-0

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