Sustainability in Viticulture and Oenology: The Final Conference of the YeSVitE Project

The wine world is going through a rapid transformation due to a deep change in consumer preferences, consumption habits and accompanied by an important reduction in economic resources available to the people. Thus, the modern viticulture and oenology has the key role of innovating traditional practices by supporting new choices for a sustainable production of wine. In general, many of the current challenges faced by the world of wine can be addressed in the YeSVitE project including production quality, making ‘healthier’ wines, and establishing the concept of sustainability in winemaking. The strategic aim of the project is to create a coordinated network that can learn how to manage the topic of sustainability in oenology bringing innovation by exploiting yeasts as the principle resource, a still untapped source in food production. The consortium of YeSVitE is built around the project that is mainly focused on training and transfer of knowledge and on research activity, a scientific proposal that is gradually nurturing the knowledge and competences of the involved researchers. As far the training activity, 29 researchers, for a total of 71 months eligible for funding, have implemented their competences during the project. All parties of the network have participated to the transfer of knowledge exchanging the following skills: microbial isolation techniques, novel high-throughput yeast phenotyping methods, fermentation technology in batch cultivations, management of spontaneous fermentations, techniques for the assessment of microbial interactions, Next-generation sequencing, use of software for the genetic comparison of genomes, use of software for clustering analysis and elaboration of SNPs, custom-made methods for NGS yeast genome data assembly and annotation, use of CRISPR/Cas9 approach to silence genes, FTIR metabolomics, and data elaboration of metagenomics results. From the research activity point of view, the project has released more than 60 scientific products (such as oral and poster presentations in international conferences, scientific reports per each secondment, original research papers and attractive yeast strains) in 4 years regarding the four programmed work packages (WPs): WP1, The diversity “challenge” of fermentative yeasts in ancient and new vine growing areas; WP2, Yeast genetic improvement for sustainable wine; WP3, Exploitation of Saccharomyces and non-Saccharomyces yeasts to manage wine fermentation; WP4, Natural interactions between grape and wine-related organisms for a sustainable oenology. In the last two years, the YeSVitE consortium has been oriented towards a wine optimization that promotes the concept of “food for future”. Thus, environment, food safety, food quality, and innovation represent the keywords of the final results of the project. First, benefits concerning the activity of isolation and selection of new yeast species/strains for wine production and the exploitation of the natural microbiota found in any individual grape must could be directed to the operators of oenological chain and to starter’s industry in the future. The innovations introduced by the setting up of new protocol could support a direct relationship between product and territory; actually, a common patrimony constitutes a resource to the valorisation of typical food products. Second, the contribution of the partnership on wine chain sustainability could be played out on the control of fungal diseases and mycotoxins contamination and the reduction of alcohol and sulphite levels in winemaking. The exploitation of the natural antagonistic potential of various yeasts against molds during grape maturation and post-harvesting represents an innovative and eco-friendly strategy to face the negative impact of chemical compounds in the environment. According to the European policy on consumer health the change of the alcohol and sulphite content is fundamental for the future of the wine product. Finally, the expected increasing of competence and knowhow of the involved researchers will represent an advantage for the whole productive chain, allowing competitive young scientists to access to job career with a vision of sustainability.