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Cultivar, site or harvest date: the gordian knot of wine terroir

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Abstract

Introduction

The complex interactions of vine cultivars, and localised regional climate associated with specific vineyard sites are important attributes to the concept of terroir and significant contributors to grape maturity and wine sensory profiles. An improved understanding of the influence of each factor and their interactions is a challenging conundrum, and will enable more efficient production targeting specific wine styles.

Objectives

To characterise the metabolic flux of grape berries and resulting wines to characterise the relative impact of site specific climate, cultivar, and grape maturity based upon berry sugar accumulation models that consistently target specific wine styles.

Methods

A spatial and temporal study of grape and wine composition was undertaken for two important cultivars in two distinct regions of New South Wales. Measures of composition and wine sensory ratings were simultaneously analysed using a multiblock algorithm taking advantage of the ANOVA framework to identify important contributions to wine style arising from grape maturity, vineyard site and cultivar.

Results

A consistent flux of grape and wine constituents is evident for wine made from sequentially harvested grapes from the same vineyard with increasing levels of grape maturity. Contributions of region and vineyard site to wine style could also be elucidated. Differences in metabolite flux in grapes and resulting wines between cultivars growing in similar conditions are evident.

Conclusions

The combination of a metabolomics and multiblock data decomposition approach may be successfully used to profile and elucidate the contribution of abiotic factors to grape and wine composition and provide improved understanding of the terroir concept.

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Data availability

All data from this study is available from the Charles Sturt University Research Output https://doi.org/10.26189/5da7a9823c55d

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Funding

This study was funded by Australia’s grapegrowers and winemakers through their investment body Wine Australia, with matching funds from the Australian Government (Grant NWG1301). The National Wine and Grape Industry Centre is an alliance between Charles Sturt University, New South Wales Department of Primary Industries and the New South Wales Wine Industry Association.

Author information

Author notes

  1. G. Antalick

    Present address: Wine Research Centre, Univerza v Novi Gorici, Vipavska 13, 5000, Nova Gorica, Slovenia

  2. K. Šuklje

    Present address: Department of Fruit Growing, Viticulture and Oenology, Agricultural Institute of Slovenia, Hacquetova 17, 1000, Ljubljana, Slovenia

  3. A. Deloire

    Present address: L’Institut Agro (SupAgro), 2 Place P. Viala, 34060, Montpellier, France

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Agricultural and Wine Sciences, National Wine and Grape Industry Centre, Charles Sturt University, Locked Bag 588, Wagga Wagga, NSW, 2678, Australia

    L. M. Schmidtke, G. Antalick, K. Šuklje, J. W. Blackman & A. Deloire

  2. Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Western Switzerland, University of Geneva, Rue Michel-Servet 1, 1211, Geneva 4, Switzerland

    J. Boccard

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  1. L. M. Schmidtke
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Contributions

LS, GA, KS, JWB and AD designed the study, collected samples and performed analysis. JWB conducted sensory studies. LS and JB performed statistical analysis of data. All authors wrote and approved the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to L. M. Schmidtke.

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Conflict of interest

All authors declare that they have no conflict of interest directly or indirectly related to the research presented in this manuscript.

Ethical approval

The study was approved by the Charles Sturt University Faculty of Science Low Risk Ethics Review Committee.

Research involving human participants and/or animals

All procedures performed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institution and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Written informed consent was obtained from every subject before inclusion in this study.

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Schmidtke, L.M., Antalick, G., Šuklje, K. et al. Cultivar, site or harvest date: the gordian knot of wine terroir. Metabolomics 16, 52 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11306-020-01673-3

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