Highlights of the Year 1998
- Collaboration with a large commercial wine company showed
that Near Infrared Spectroscopy (NIR) may provide an ultra rapid
and affordable technique for measurement of grape and wine
quality parameters.
- Development and validation of techniques for the rapid
measurement of seven oak derived key wine components and the
adaptation of these for use by our Analytical Services.
- Continued refinement for measurements of the taint compound,
Trichloroanisole (TCA) reveals that most cork screening
procedures currently used by industry in Australia are likely to
underestimate significantly the proportion of corks in a batch
that are tainted. A new screening strategy based on evaluation
of individual corks is recommended.
- Experiments with synthetic polymers showed that methods can
be developed for a partial cleanup of wines tainted with
chloroanisoles.
- A robust AFLP technique has been developed to effectively
provide genetic fingerprints of winery yeasts and provide much
higher discrimination power than classical techniques for yeast
identification.
- Genetic modification of a winery yeast demonstrates that
glycerol production can be highly elevated with a concomitant
reduction in ethanol production.
- A very large national survey showed that grape
glycosyl-glucose (G-G) values of red grapes correlate with the
flavour intensity of the resultant wines. For red grapes, colour
content also appears to correlate well with the flavour intensity
of the resultant wines.
- A group of researchers and experienced industry personnel
have developed a structured vocabulary that can be used to
describe the astringent and mouthfeel characteristics of red
wines.
- Roadshow visits were made to Victoria, South Australia and
Tasmania with seminars held in 13 regions.
- The Institute’s extension service has responded to a
record number of enquiries. The number of problem related
investigations remained steady at 844, however, the number of
enquiries of a technical nature exceeded 2152.
- The Institute has upgraded its information technology
infrastructure and is moving towards a single computer platform.
All staff now have access to their own e-mail account.
- Nick Bruer completed his Bachelor of Applied Science, Wine
Science, degree at Charles Sturt University, after six years of
study by correspondence. He finished top of his class, and won
the Tucker Seabrook Prize, which is awarded to ‘the most
outstanding graduating student from either the BAppSc (Wine
Science) or BAppSc (Viticulture) courses at Charles Sturt
University’
- The Analytical Service continued its strong growth and superb
performance in international proficiency tests. A major focus
has been placed on development of new services and development of
a business plan.
- The eight and the ninth Advanced Wine Assessment Courses were
conducted. This gave another 60 participants the opportunity to
test, and in many cases improve, their sensory evaluation
performance.
