Volatile organic compounds in disease-resistant grapevine hybrids

Grapevine is one of the most important crop plants worldwide. Among many existing grapevine species, Vitis vinifera subsp. sativa is by far the most commonly used one in winemaking. However, this species is susceptible to many diseases such as downy or powdery mildew. For this reason, the use of pesticides has become essential in the grape production. One approach to overcome this problem was the generation of Vitis hybrids by crossing Vitis vinifera species with disease-resistant American or Asian species. Unfortunately, besides of resistance traits also negative quality compounds derive from these wild species and can be present in the obtained hybrids. Since volatile organic compounds (VOCs) play a major role in terms of grape quality, this work gives an inside into the aroma profile of various grapevine hybrids. Two different techniques were used: Headspace Solid-Phase Microextraction - Gas Chromatography with Mass Spectrometry (HS-SPME-GC-MS) and Proton Transfer Reaction - Mass Spectrometry (PTR-MS). These two complementary techniques allowed a differentiation of the 74 studied grapevine accessions according to their aromatic profile. These results are important for grapevine breeding as they can be employed both for positive and negative selection.