Distribution of selected elements as wine origin markers in the wine-making products

Abstract

The analysis of the trace elements has been shown to be a valuable tool to discriminate wines according to their region of origin. As, Ba, Ca, Co, Cr, Li, Mg, Rb, Sn, Sr, and V were selected as specific markers indicating the origin of Slovak wines according to the vineyard regions. Several factors, such as the environmental contamination, agricultural practices, climatic changes, and others, may markedly change the multielement composition of the wine and may endanger the relationship between the wine and the soil composition. The effect was studied of the viniculture process on the distribution of selected markers in the winemaking products. The main markers pass from the vineyard soil to the grape, and the main portion leaves the winemaking process in the press cake and yeast lees. Very significant correlation of the wine origin markers was found between changed the wine making products and the vineyard soils. The sugar addition to grape juice to some extent the total element compositions of wines but did not result in substantial changes of the markers determining the wine origin.

Keywords

• elements
• atomic absorption spectrometry
• winemaking process
• factor analysis
• correlation