Travel scholarship to Spain, France and Germany
Abstract
The Wine Australia grant GWT 1117 was intended for travelling to: The University of La Rioja (UoLR), Logrono (Spain) for visiting collaborator Prof. Javier Tardaguila Dijon and Reims (France) and participate to the 9th International Terroir Congress Geisenheim (Germany) to attend the 7th International Symposium on Irrigation of Horticultural Crops Note: after discussion with my supervisor Prof. Steve Tyerman and considering my involvement in the Vineyard of the Future initiative of the University of Adelaide (UoA) it was decided that it would have been of more interest for my research and of more relevance for the Australian wine industry my participation to the 1st International Workshop on Vineyard Mechanization and Grape and Wine Quality that was held in Piacenza (ITALY) from June 27 to 29. For this reason I did not participate to the International Terroir Congress since it has been held on the same week as the Mechanization one.
Summary
The main objective of this project was to visit the University of La Rioja (UoLR) to work collaboratively with the viticulture group led by Prof. Javier Tardaguila on hyperspectral imaging (HI) applied to grapevine physiology. HI is becoming an increasingly important method in plant science since information derived from spectra allows the non-destructive measurement of various components of plant physiology, such as nutrient content, secondary metabolite accumulation, pathogen infection and water status. Whilst I already use reflectance spectra recorded with spectroradiometers for my research, it is important to note that these instruments provide point measurements but no spatial resolution. Hyperspectral cameras (HC) combine spatial and spectral resolution. During my five weeks visit I analysed hyperspectral images of the whole canopy taken from Sangiovese grapevines subjected to different irrigation treatments. The main findings were: It was possible to build a calibration for the prediction of grapevine water potential from whole-canopy non-invasive HI taken outdoors. The relationship between spectral data, photosynthesis and stomatal conductance proved to be satisfactory. This is the first in-vineyard application of ground-based HI to assess grapevine water status. The method is a non-invasive spatial approach that could offer a more insightful understanding of the grapevine water usage. Results obtained during this visit will be summarised in two scientific papers (in preparation) to be submitted to the Australian Journal of Grape and Wine Research. Also, the results will be presented at the 9th International Symposium on grapevine physiology and biotechnology that will be held in Chile in April 2013 and at the 18th International GiESCO conference that will be held in July in Portugal. The UoA and UoLR are now collaborating in “The Vineyard of the Future” initiative. The second objective of the project was to attend the 1st International Workshop on Vineyard Mechanization and Grape and Wine Quality that was held in Piacenza, Italy. The topics of discussion for this first workshop included: Precision viticulture Mechanical harvesting and spraying Mechanical winter and summer pruning Mechanization systems, automation and economics The conference outlined that there is a great body of research being conducted in all viticultural areas around the World to promote and implement the use of mechanization in the vineyard but also developing new and better tools for precision viticulture. The “vineyard of the future” initiative of the UoA focuses on developing and implementing better tools for automation in the vineyard to assist climate change research and crop adaptation. The last objective of the project was to attend 7th International Symposium on Irrigation of Horticultural Crops and present my paper entitled: Advances in the use of near infrared spectroscopy for plant water stress monitoring. The main themes at the conference were: Evapotranspiration and canopy processes Irrigation scheduling Water quality / water re-use and salinity Modelling and climate change Remote sensing Water / carbon footprint and socio-economic consequences Key discussions, interesting conference presentations and possible collaborations will be discussed in greater detail later on this report. I thank Wine Australia for supporting this project.