Location: Horticultural Crops Production and Genetic Improvement Research Unit
2024 Annual Report
Objectives
This project’s overall goal is to refine agricultural management practices that growers use to improve fruit and fruit product quality.
Objective 1: Determine the impacts of variety selection and production management practices on fruit and product quality components to optimize practices for superior fruit and wine production. [NP 305, Component 1, Problem Statement 1B]
Subobjective 1A: Determine primary and secondary metabolites and their targeted analyses; evaluate and optimize analytical methods where insufficient data exists.
Subobjective 1B: Evaluate developed quality component measurements on new or improved fruit and fruit products, and link to agricultural management.
Objective 2: postponed until vacancy is filled.
Objective 3: Enhance management practices for small fruit production systems by optimizing soil health, weed suppression, and the interplay between plants and ecosystem dynamics for desired outcomes.
Approach
Project objectives will be accomplished by integrating research across three core disciplines: food chemistry/phytochemical analysis, crop physiology, and plant breeding. A systematic approach, with targeted analyses of fruit quality compounds, will be utilized to predict the magnitude that environmental factors and cultural practices impart to fruit quality. This strategy will allow us to improve and define analytical methods for plant metabolite analyses that advance our comprehension of the interactions between canopy management, vine nutrient treatments, water regimes, vineyard microbiome, vine virus status, and cultivar/genotype selections have upon fruit development, fruit quality components, and vine physiology. An additional growing season will be employed, if necessary, to account for interruptions during the experimental treatment or sampling schedules.
Progress Report
This report documents FY 2024 progress for project 2072-21000-057-00D, “Improved Fruit, Grape and Wine Products through Precision Agriculture and Quality Component Evaluation”, which began in May 2020.
ARS researchers in Corvallis, Oregon, continued investigations into fruit, plant, and soil quality advancements made through agricultural management practices. In support of Objective 1, research was conducted on how wine grape and wine quality was altered by biotic/abiotic stressors and wine making technique changes. Winemakers are interested in new ways to enhance consumers wine experience and give their products a marketplace edge. Wine fault development was investigated in finished Riesling wines during storage by inoculation with known spoilage microorganisms, and then contrasting the acuteness of electronic tongue (e-tongue) with human sensory evaluation. Smoke affected wines were also obtained from US commercial winemakers, and consumers assessed these wines subjectively before and after saliva addition. These saliva spiked samples were also evaluated objectively, using e-tongue to determine influence of saliva on smoke affected wine sensory profile. ARS researchers efforts to screen commercial vineyards vine virus status and their impact on grape quality is also ongoing. Critical vacancies prevented significant progress to Objective 2.
In support of Objective 3, comprehensive post vineyard establishment soil sampling down to 90 cm was completed in a recently established 4.5 acre soil health research vineyard. To further basic research on soil health, a collaborative project between groups at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory, and ARS was continued to identify particulate organic matter X-ray computed tomography (XCT) scans of soil cores and aggregates. A workflow was further refined to apply deep learning tools, like those used by self-driving cars to navigate, for the automatic detection and quantification of particulate organic matter in XCT soils. This workflow can be applied to any image data set, allowing for the identification and quantification of complex features in images. This workflow was further adapted for use analyzing images of grapes, berries, hops, and potatoes.
Accomplishments
1. Impact of saliva on U.S. smoke affected wine. Wildfire, agricultural burning, and smoke have been implicated in negatively affecting wine grape quality components, and ultimately the resulting wine. An ARS scientist in Corvallis, Oregon, and Washington State University collaborators obtained 36 smoke impacted commercial wines from California, Oregon, and Washington and studied how saliva interacts with these wines. Saliva decreased overall liking of these wines, with none rating above the “might purchase” category, indicating very few consumers would buy these wines if they were allowed to taste them first. This work demonstrates the importance of including in-mouth changes when studying smoke exposed wine quality.
2. Tools for early white wine fault monitoring. Tools permitting early detection of wine faults are important for winemakers and allow corrections to products before releasing them to consumers. Many wine problems are traditionally discovered by continuous tasting throughout production, though this can be subjective and cause palate fatigue. Electronic-tongue (e-tongue) is a relatively new device that had not yet been applied to white wine fault monitoring. An ARS scientist in Corvallis, Oregon, and Washington State University collaborators worked to determine if white wine spoilage organism faults can be picked up by e-tongue alongside a human sensory panel. E-tongue was able to sense a change three weeks before the human sensory panel was able to notice it. Study results indicate e-tongue is a potentially effective tool for monitoring white wine quality. This work was partially funded by the Northwest Center for Small Fruits Research (NCSFR).
3. New grapevine viruses reported for the first time in the United States. Not all grapevine viruses significantly impact quality, though how this grapevine virus might influence grape quality is not yet known, so further study will be required. An ARS scientist in Corvallis, Oregon, and University of Idaho collaborators were the first report on three endornaviruses found in Idaho grapevines from commercially operating vineyards, two of which are new identifications within the United States. Endornaviruses can be found in a range of plants and fungi, often without ill effects to the host. As replacing large numbers of vines is not economically feasible for many working vineyards, determining a vine’s virus status is crucial in formulating appropriate viticultural and enological strategies for mitigating virus infections. This work was partially funded by the Northwest Center for Small Fruits Research (NCSFR) and the Idaho State Department of Agriculture Specialty Crop Block Grant.
4. Some plant parasitic nematodes are sensitive to soil pH, some are not. Plant parasitic nematodes are costly pests that cause global crop loss of over $100 billion dollars. Previously it was thought that the large populations of ring nematode in Oregon and Northern root-knot nematode in Washington vineyards were caused by differences in soil characteristics. ARS researchers in Prosser, Washington, and Corvallis, Oregon, found that soil texture had no influence on both nematodes’ population growth. This work showed that Northern root-knot nematodes that live inside of the roots thrived in acidic (low pH) soil more than alkaline (high pH) soil. Soil pH had no effect on ring nematodes that live outside of the roots. These results will help generate parasitism risk maps and will also help wine grape growers make sound vineyard planting decisions. This work was partially funded by the Northwest Center for Small Fruits Research (NCSFR).
5. Grape seed internal structures change before and after fermentation. During red wine fermentation, all grape parts undergo big physical and chemical changes. Past research has focused on the chemical processes that influence the release of grape compounds like tannins from seeds, which are important for wine taste, texture, and quality. However, little research has been conducted to understand how the seeds might physically change during fermentation which could also change what ends up in the wine. ARS scientists in Prosser, Washington, and Davis, California, and University of California-Davis collaborators used X-ray imaging and high energy penetrating picture taking, to quantify for the first time how fermentation changes grape seed internal parts, which could affect important chemical processes during wine making. These results will help wine makers and scientists better understand some of the physical processes occurring inside of grape seeds during wine making and using the byproducts for value-added food ingredients like dietary supplements.
Review Publications
Waterhouse, H., Aburto, F., Rees, G., Griffin-Lahue, D., Salls, W.B., Rippner, D.A., Tian, Z., Scow, K., O'Geen, A.T. 2023. Diversified vegetation types on rangelands promote multiple soil-based ecosystem services. Land Degradation and Development. 35(3):1011-1028. https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.4967.
Paup, V.D., Montero, M.L., Ross, C.F., Lee, J. 2024. Influence of saliva on the sensory properties of US commercial smoke affected wines: Preliminary findings. Food Science and Nutrition. 12(4):2736-2746. https://doi.org/10.1002/fsn3.3954.
Gillispie, E.C., Miller, K.V., McElrone, A.J., Block, D.E., Rippner, D.A. 2023. Red wine fermentation alters grape seed morphology and internal porosity. American Journal of Enology and Viticulture. 74(2). Article 0740030. https://doi.org/10.5344/ajev.2023.23025.
East, K.E., Zasada, I.A., Lee, J., Schreiner, R.P., Rippner, D.A. 2023. Vineyard soil texture and pH effects on Meloidogyne hapla and Mesocriconema xenoplax. Agrosystems, Geosciences & Environment. 6(4). Article 20450. https://doi.org/10.1002/agg2.20450.
Potter, R.I., Warren, C.A., Lee, J., Ross, C.F. 2024. Comparative assessment of Riesling wine fault development by the electronic tongue and a sensory panel. Journal of Food Science. 89(5):3006-3018. https://doi.org/10.1111/1750-3841.17036.
Dahan, J., Orellana, G.E., Lee, J., Karasev, A. 2024. Occurrence of grapevine yellow speckle viroid 2 and Australian grapevine viroid in Idaho grapevines. Plant Disease. 108(4):1121. https://doi.org/10.1094/PDIS-01-24-0034-PDN.
Altendorf, K.R., Heineck, G.C., Wakholi, C., Tawril, A., Raja, P., Rippner, D.A. 2023. HopBox: An image analysis pipeline to characterize hop cone morphology. The Plant Phenome Journal. 6(1). Article e20080. https://doi.org/10.1002/ppj2.20080.