How to control alcohol
Register now
Understanding tannins
TPO 2 be sure 2 be sure
Who’s lurking in your winery?
Come to our Roadshows!
AWRI award winners
New Web-based Winemaking Resources
Get the facts
New research on smoke
How to control alcohol
Are you looking for the latest, tried and tested methods to keep alcohol under control? AWRI researchers have produced a new Fact Sheet for grapegrowers and winemakers to adjust alcohol concentration.
Hot summers and long hours of sunshine can make it hard for Australian grape and wine producers to keep alcohol in check. Riper fruit contains higher levels of sugar, which can lead to high levels of alcohol.
Read our Fact Sheet to find out how you can keep your wine on track and avoid the negatives of high alcohol it can affect flavour, attract higher taxes in some export markets and can have repercussions for public health.
You can also email our Winemaking and Extension Services team for more information or call 08 8313 6600.
Register now
Registrations for the 14th Australian Wine Industry Technical Conference (AWITC) are coming in from around the world and workshops are filling fast.
The conference will be held in Adelaide from 3-8 July 2010, with over 200 technical posters on display and a comprehensive workshop program.
The event is an ideal opportunity to meet key players in the grape and wine sector to build knowledge, share experiences, highlight business opportunities and create change.
Click here for a ‘snap shot’ of all of the conference activities, or click here for the full conference program (scroll to page 5 for full session details).
Many workshops are selling out, so register today to guarantee your spot.
For more information, email Conference Manager, Kate Beames or telephone: 08 8313 6696.
Understanding tannins
AWRI researchers have made new discoveries about the way that tannin interacts with other wine components, with repercussions for the mouth-feel of some wines.
An initial study under model wine conditions has shown that grape-derived cell wall materials have a stronger affinity for seed tannins than skin tannins of a similar size. Click here to access the paper.
The results will form the basis of research on tannin interactions with non-phenolic polymers. Experiments are underway to understand the selectivity of grape-based molecules for binding to tannins, influencing important mouth-feel attributes.
To learn more about wine tannins come along to the Managing tannins in the vineyard and winery workshop at the 14th AWITC.
TPO 2 be sure 2 be sure
Oxygen levels in wine can have a major effect on wine quality and shelf-life. To help winemakers quantify and manage total package oxygen (TPO) levels, the AWRI is offering a benchmarking service and has designed a new tool, now available on the web.
Total package oxygen consists of dissolved oxygen in the wine matrix – that many bottling facilities currently monitor – and the oxygen residing in the headspace.
The AWRI’s oxygen management benchmarking service, using the NomaSense, accurately quantifies headspace oxygen levels which are typically well in excess of dissolved oxygen levels.
A web-based tool has been developed to help bottling operations to estimate the TPO through dissolved oxygen measurements.
The AWRI has also designed a new workshop to help winemakers manage oxygen levels effectively.
The workshop is part of the AWITC program. Click here for more information.
Who’s lurking in your winery?
To winemakers, bacteria and yeast can be friends or foes. Knowing which microbes are in your winery, and how they can be managed, is critical for consistent, quality wine production and to reduce the risk of contamination and spoilage.
The AWRI Commercial Services offer a Micro ID analysis that can identify thousands of different types of microbes including bacteria, fungi (yeasts) and mould, using a bacterial library with more than 1700 species, and a fungal library with more than 1000 species.
For further information email Leanne Craddock. or call on 08 8313 6600.
Come to our Roadshows!
The AWRI is visiting the Northern Slopes zone in New England from 19 – 20 May. See our packaging workshop program or our seminar program covering a range of AWRI research topics.
To book your place, email Susan Moore from the Southern New England Vignerons Association or call on 02 6775 3793 or 0427 753 793.
Find out more about our roadshows here, check when we are visiting your region, or contact Virginia Phillips for more information.
AWRI award winners
AWRI researchers have picked up awards in Germany as well as Australia, recognising pioneering work on yeast development and regionality.
At the Intervitis Interfructa congress, held in Stuttgart in March, an AWRI-developed yeast won the Innovation Award 2010. Commercially available, the yeast Maurivin Platinum does not produce detectible hydrogen sulfide. The AWRI’s research team was Toni Garcia Cordente, Hentie Swiegers and Chris Curtin. For further information contact Winemaking and Extension Services.
The AWRI also won two awards at the 14th Australian Near Infrared Spectroscopy Conference held at the National Wine Centre in Adelaide last month. Visiting scientist, Roberto Riovanto from the University of Padua, won the The Lynsey Welsh Award for innovation in NIR spectroscopy and its use as a tool to trace and authenticate Australian wines from different regions.
The AWRI’s Mariola Kwiatkowski won the Best Poster Prize at the same conference. Entitled ‘VIS-NIR spectroscopy to predict selected chemical parameters in unopened bottles of Sauvignon Blanc wines’. The poster was co-authored by Mariola Kwiatkowski, Maurizio Ugliano and Elizabeth Waters. A copy of the poster can be found here.
New Web-based Winemaking Resources
Check out the new ‘Winemaking Resources‘ section of the AWRI website. The section includes winemaking calculators, laboratory methods and fermentation information with yeast hydration and preparation; ferment graphs that allow you to plot your ferment each day; YAN and nutrient information; and methods to restart stuck fermentations.
New FAQs include Oxidative pinking, Elemental sulfur and Botrytis.
The AWRI’s Taint and Packaging Roadshow sections now link to relevant information, such as taint and fault thresholds, assessment methods, prevention and wine disposal of tainted or non-saleable wine.
If you would like particular information to be added to our website, please contact Geoff Cowey.
Get the facts
To get the facts about AWRI research and find out how the AWRI can help you, check out the Fact Sheets, also on the AWRI website.
From ‘Applications of Spectroscopy‘ to ‘Smoke taint‘ and ‘Stuck fermentation‘ to ‘Tannin‘ you’ll find user-friendly guides to AWRI research findings as well as ‘Winemaking and Extension Services‘.
If you can’t find the information you need or you have ideas for other Fact Sheets, we’d love your feedback.
New research on smoke
New research papers on smoke taint are now available from the AWRI Library. To get your copies, contact Anne, Ingrid and Sean at infoservices@awri.com.au
The papers are:
Hayasaka, Y., Dungey, K.A., Baldock, G.A., Kennison, K.R., Wilkinson, K.L. Identification of a -D-glucopyranoside precursor to guaiacol in grape juice following grapevine exposure to smoke. Analytica Chimica Acta 660, (1-2): 143-148 ; 2010.
Hayasaka, Y., Baldock, G.A., Pardon, K.H., Jeffery, D.W., Herderich, M.J. Investigation into the formation of guaiacol conjugates in berries and leaves of grapevine Vitis vinifera L. cv. Cabernet sauvignon using stable isotope tracers combined with HPLC-MS and MS/MS analysis. Journal of agricultural and food chemistry 58 (4): 2076-2081 ; 2010.
Kennison, K.R., Wilkinson, K.L., Pollnitz, A.P., Williams, H.G., Gibberd, M.R. Effect of timing and duration of grapevine exposure to smoke on the composition an sensory properties of wine. Australian journal of grape and wine research 15 (3): 228-237 ; 2009.