Selection of indigenous wine yeasts and bacteria for terroir’s characterization of regional wines and bio-protection with the aim of reducing energy inputs and chemical additives for wine production

Supervisors: Prof. Lucilla Iacumin

Project description:
The main object of this project is to select indigenous oenological yeast and bacteria starters with the purpose of improving the sustainability of winemaking, reducing winery inputs, and lowering management costs in order to contrast the climate change problems.
The selection of indigenous yeasts, both Saccharomyces/ non-Saccharomyces, is fundamental for the enhancement of the territory and for the maintenance of biodiversity, avoiding the homologation of products ensuring typicality and recognizability to Friuli wines on the global market.
The production of multi-starter has the purpose of mimicking the spontaneous fermentation process avoiding stops or slowdowns, and obtaining wines with superior organoleptic characteristics with an extreme aromatic cleanliness thereby leading a winemaking production.
In addition, over the years sustainability has become important for consumers and climate changes require the development of new winemaking approaches to counteract and solve the new emerging problems. For this reason scientific research pays great attention to select oenological starters to reduce the input during winemaking.
This is in line with the objectives of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, an action programme for people, planet and prosperity signed in September 2015 by the governments of the United Nations’ 193 member countries (UN). It includes 17 Objectives
for Sustainable Development set of important issues: the fight against poverty, the eradication of hunger and the fight against climate change.
The parameters that the research is looking for are:
Fermentation at higher temperatures using thermotolerant yeast strains
Bio-protection effect
Low EtOH production with mixed fermentation
Bio-acidification
Use of lactic acid bacteria as bio-protectors
Lower SO2 and acetaldehyde concentrations
The production of multi-starter has the purpose of mimicking the spontaneous fermentation process avoiding stops or slowdowns, and obtaining wines with superior organoleptic characteristics with an extreme aromatic cleanliness thereby leading a winemaking production with less inputs

Biography and contacts:
Gridello Emma was born in 1999 in Tolmezzo (Italy).
In 2021 she graduated in Viticulture and Oenology at the University of Udine (109/110)
In 2023 she obtained an MSc degree in Viticulture, Oenology and Wine Markets at the University of Udine (110/110 cum laude).
In January 2024, she started the doctoral course at the Ph.D. school “Food Sciences” at the University of Udine.

E-mail: gridello.emma@spes.uniud.it
Phone: +39 348 860 5944