Abstract:

The consumer acceptability of wines depends upon theira specific aroma and sensory characteristics which depend largely on metabolites contributed by grapes as well as fermenting yeast. Such metabolites can be encouraged in wines through fermentation management which is one of the key steps in wine quality control by supplementation of UFAs, microoxygenation etc. and quantifying the wine quality through metabolomics. Hence, enologists as well as wine industries have been increasingly working on the most efficient practices to produce high-quality wine that caters to both the aroma and taste of wine. Studies have been conducted to improve wine quality by mining the quality traits of fermentation yeast (S. cerevisiae). Different strains of yeast produce varying quality and quantity of metabolites like amino acids, nitrogen and unsaturated fatty acids during fermentation which provides wine its distinctive characteristics. In the present study, ethanol production was significantly increased with supplementation of oleic acid. Further, a micro-oxygenation process has been developed that revealedan increased production of various metabolites such as total phenols (24.28%) as well as improvement in colour intensity (4.67%) over three months when an oxygen dosagee of 0.025 LPM is supplied in an incremental manner. Metabolomics is utilized to quantitatively measure the small number of known metabolites in wine thus providing a better understanding of the fine volatile metabolites and the basis for wine flavor profile.