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'Regent' is the fungal resistant grapevine cultivar with the highest acreage in Germany and an important resistance donor in international breeding programs. It carries the resistance loci Rpv3.1 as well as Ren3 and Ren9 against downy and powdery mildew, respectively. As the parents of 'Chambourcin', the resistant paternal ancestor of 'Regent', did not coincide with the breeder's information, the germplasm repository of JKI Geilweilerhof was screened to find the missing ancestors. SSR marker analysis revealed that 'Joannes Seyve 11369' and 'Plantet' are the true parents of 'Chambourcin' and not 'Seyve Villard 12-417' and 'Chancellor'. Furthermore, the origin of the resistance loci Ren3 and Ren9 could be traced back to the genotypes 'Seibel 4614' and 'Munson'. Since the breeder Hermann Jaeger mentioned 'Munson' as a direct descendant of Vitis aestivalis Michx. var. linsecomii (Buckley) L. H. Bailey and Vitis rupestris Scheele, one of these wild species might have been the donor of the loci., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 60 No. 4 (2021): Vitis

Grape resilience towards Botrytis cinerea (B. cinerea) infections (Botrytis bunch rot) is an important concern of breeders and growers. Beside grape bunch architecture, berry surface characteristics like berry bloom (epicuticular wax) as well as thickness and permeability of the berry cuticle represent further promising physical barriers to increase resilience towards Botrytis bunch rot. In previous studies, two efficient sensor-based phenotyping methods were developed to evaluate both berry surface traits fast and objectively: (1) light-separated RGB (red-green-blue) image analysis to determine the distribution of epicuticular wax on the berry surface; and (2) electrical impedance characteristics of the grape berry cuticle based on point measurements. The present proof-of-concept study aiming at the evaluation of light-separated RGB images for both phenotyping applications, phenotyping wax distribution pattern and berry cuticle impedance values. Within the selected grapevine varieties like 'Riesling', 'Sauvignon Blanc' or 'Calardis Blanc' five contributions were achieved: (1) Both phenotyping approaches were fused into one prototypic unified phenotyping method achieving a wax detection accuracy of 98.6 % and a prediction of electrical impedance with an accuracy of 95 %. (2) Both traits are derived using only light-separated images of the grapevine berries. (3) The improved method allows the detection and quantification of additional surface traits of the grape berry surface such as lenticels (punctual lignification) and the berry stem that are also known as being able to affect the grape susceptibility towards Botrytis. (4) The improved image analysis tools are further integrated into a comprehensive workbench allowing end-users, like breeders to combine phenotyping experiments with transparent data management offering valuable services like visualizations, indexing, etc. (5) Annotation work is supported by a sophisticated annotation tool of the image analysis workbench. The usage of light-separated images enables fast and non-invasive phenotyping of different optical berry surface characteristics, which saves time-consuming labor and additionally allows the reuse of the berry samples for subsequent investigations, e.g. Botrytis infection studies., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 60 No. 1 (2021): Vitis

Plant roots are essential for water and nutrient uptake and contribute to the plants' response to environmental stress factors. As the hidden half of a plant, investigation of root systems is highly challenging, most of available methods are destructive and very labour-intensive. In this proof-of-concept study, a non-invasive X-ray micro computed tomography (X-ray µCT) method was applied to investigate the phenotypic variation of the complex three-dimensional (3D) architecture of grapevine roots as a function of genotype and soil. Woody cuttings of 'Calardis Musqué', 'Villard Blanc' and V3125 ('Schiava Grossa' x 'Riesling') were cultivated in polypropylene columns filled with two different soil types, clay loam and sandy loam, for 6 weeks. Afterwards, the columns were scanned once using the technique of X-ray µCT. The received raw data were analysed for the reconstruction of 3D root system models (3D model), which display a non-destructive visualization of whole, intact root systems with a spatial resolution of 42 µm. The 3D models of all investigated plants (in total 18) were applied to quantify root system characteristics precisely by measuring adventitious root length, lateral root length, total root length, root system surface area, root system volume and root growth angles from the woody cutting relative to a horizontal axis. The results showed that: (i) early root formation and root growth differed between genotypes, especially between 'Calardis Musqué' and 'Villard Blanc'; and (ii) the soil type does influence adventitious root formation of V3125, but had minor effects on 'Calardis Musqué' and 'Villard Blanc'. In conclusion, this innovative, high-resolution method of X-ray µCT is suitable for high resolution phenotyping of root formation, architecture, and rooting characteristics of grapevine woody cuttings in a non-destructive manner, e.g. to investigate root response to drought stress and would provide new insights into phylloxera root infection., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 60 No. 1 (2021): Vitis

In the era of big and omics data, good organization, management, and description of experimental data are crucial for achieving high-quality datasets. This, in turn, is essential for the export of robust results, to publish reliable papers, make data more easily available, and unlock the huge potential of data reuse. Lately, more and more journals now require authors to share data and metadata according to the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles. This work aims to provide a step-by-step guideline for the FAIR data and metadata management specific to grapevine and wine science. In detail, the guidelines include recommendations for the organization of data and metadata regarding (i) meaningful information on experimental design and phenotyping, (ii) sample collection, (iii) sample preparation, (iv) chemotype analysis, (v) data analysis (vi) metabolite annotation, and (vii) basic ontologies. We hope that these guidelines will be helpful for the grapevine and wine metabolomics community and that it will benefit from the true potential of data usage in creating new knowledge being revealed.

Yield and its prediction is one of the most important tasks in grapevine breeding purposes and vineyard management. Commonly, this trait is estimated manually right before harvest by extrapolation, which mostly is labor-intensive, destructive and inaccurate. In the present study an automated image-based workflow was developed for quantifying inflorescences and single flowers in unprepared field images of grapevines, i.e. no artificial background or light was applied. It is a novel approach for non-invasive, inexpensive and objective phenotyping with high-throughput. First, image regions depicting inflorescences were identified and localized. This was done by segmenting the images into the classes "inflorescence" and "non-inflorescence" using a Fully Convolutional Network (FCN). Efficient image segmentation hereby is the most challenging step regarding the small geometry and dense distribution of single flowers (several hundred single flowers per inflorescence), similar color of all plant organs in the fore- and background as well as the circumstance that only approximately 5 % of an image show inflorescences. The trained FCN achieved a mean Intersection Over Union (IOU) of 87.6 % on the test data set. Finally, single flowers were extracted from the "inflorescence"-areas using Circular Hough Transform. The flower extraction achieved a recall of 80.3 % and a precision of 70.7 % using the segmentation derived by the trained FCN model. Summarized, the presented approach is a promising strategy in order to predict yield potential automatically in the earliest stage of grapevine development which is applicable for objective monitoring and evaluations of breeding material, genetic repositories or commercial vineyards., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol 58 No 3 (2019): Vitis

Viticulture is of high economic value. Traditional grapevine cultivars (Vitis vinifera L.) are used in adaptation to the climatic conditions from Northern to Southern European growing areas. However, the recent trend of global warming causes quality deficits due to a shift of the plant's development to earlier times in the year. As a consequence, premature ripening happens under warm temperatures and interferes with the balanced accumulation of sugars, acids, aroma profiles and berry coloration. Modern grapevine breeding is challenged to include the ripening behavior as an important trait (besides pathogen resistance and other characteristics) into the development of novel cultivars well suited for sustainable viticulture. Breeders nowadays apply molecular markers to follow the introgression of desired traits on the genetic level. Previous work has identified a molecular tag on grapevine chromosome 16 strongly linked to the time of véraison, the start of the second phase of berry ripening, in a segregating cross population. In this study we analyzed the transferability of this marker to a set of 36 grapevine cultivars commonly used in German viticulture. Association analysis verified the predictive character of the time point of véraison for maturation time and confirmed the diagnostic potential of the véraison-linked marker in this extended set of cultivars., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol 57 No 3 (2018): Vitis

Semi minimal pruned hedge (SMPH) is a time and cost saving grapevine training system, which is becoming more and more popular in German viticulture. In this study we compared the canopy architecture and its effect on the microclimate of SMPH trained grapevines with those of plants trained in vertical shoot positioning (VSP). We detected a 3 % points higher humidity and a 0.9 °C lower mean temperature within the complex canopy architecture of SMPH trained vines compared to VSP. Moreover, we investigated the influence of the differing microclimate, canopy and bunch architecture, as well as berry skin characteristics of the two training systems on the incidence of the major fungal grapevine diseases Downy Mildew, Powdery Mildew and Botrytis Bunch Rot, as well as on the occurrence and damage of the invasive insect pest Drosophila suzukii. We demonstrate that SMPH trained vines can be more susceptible to Downy Mildew and Powdery Mildew than VSP trained vines. The incidence of Botrytis Bunch Rot can be higher in the latter system, even if berry skin characteristics are the same in both training systems. We trapped a higher number of D. suzukii in SMPH canopies, however no increased berry damage was observed. Based on our results we recommend a more adapted plant protection regime for SMPH trained vines due to their higher susceptibility to the major fungal diseases. Furthermore, we propose a combination of SMPH and fungal resistant grapevine cultivars, e.g. 'Reberger', to achieve a more competitive, environmentally friendly and high quality grapevine production., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol 57 No 2 (2018): Vitis

The ascomycete Erysiphe necator causes powdery mildew disease of grapevine, a disastrous infection which is commonly defeated with multiple fungicide applications in viticulture. Breeding for natural resistance of quality grapes (Vitis vinifera) is thus a major aim of current efforts. The cultivar 'Regent' is resistant to powdery mildew due to an introgression from an American Vitis sp. resistance donor. To identify key regulatory elements in defense responses of 'Regent' we performed transcript analyses after challenging with E. necator inoculation in comparison with a susceptible grapevine. A set of genes selected from preliminary microarray hybridization results were investigated by RT-qPCR. The data indicate an important role of transcription factors MYB15, WRKY75, WRKY33, WRKY7, ethylene responsive transcription factors ERF2 and ERF5 as well as a CZF1/ZFAR transcripton factor in regulating the early defense when the fungus starts the interaction with its host by the formation of haustoria., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol 56 No 4 (2017): Vitis

Parent offspring analysis already revealed genetic relationships for Blauer Portugieser and Blaufränkisch, sharing at each locus one allele with Grüner Silvaner and Weisser Heunisch, respectively. The missing second progenitor of Blauer Portugieser and Blaufränkisch is a recently rediscovered black grapevine, called Schwarze Zimmettraube. It was found in the largest German wine growing area Rheinhessen. The same cultivar was detected as a single vine in Friuli, Italy and named Sbulzìna. The Schwarze Zimmettraube, bearing female flowers, and thus the female parent in the crosses, was cultivated in the 19th century in Lower Styria together with Grüner Silvaner and Weisser Heunisch. Because the Schwarze Zimmettraube did not exist in Austria and red wine production was fairly rare in that country before 1800, it is suspected that the cradle of Blauer Portugieser and Blaufränkisch is in Lower Styria. Furthermore, according to chlorotype analysis, it turned out that Blauer Gänsfüsser is the male parent of Schwarze Zimmettraube and thus the Schwarze Zimmettraube represents a veritable “missing link”. To prove the genetic relationships the nine GrapeGen06-markers and additional forty microsatellite markers were applied. To investigate on the geographical origin of Blauer Portugieser and Blaufränkisch historical Austrian and Styrian references were consulted., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol 55, No 3 (2016): Vitis

The Vitis vinifera background of 'Catawba' and 'Concord' was investigated by using SSR analysis: 'Sémillon' was shown to be an ancestor of 'Catawba', while the wild parent remains unknown. 'Concord' was confirmed to be an offspring of 'Catawba' and another unknown wild parent. Since these two important American varieties most likely resulted from random natural crosses and successful selection, the original, wild growing wild donors remain unknown., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 55 No. 2 (2016): Vitis

A biparental population segregating for downy mildew resistance was studied to identify resistance linked molecular markers. The progeny of 202 individuals from a cross of V3125 (susceptible breeding line) with 'Börner' (resistant rootstock) was phenotyped in the field in four seasons and by evaluating artificially infected leaf discs. QTL mapping revealed a major resistance locus on chromosome 5 that explained up to 17.4 % of the phenotypic variance. This new resistance locus was named Rpv14. It was transmitted from the male grandparent V. cinerea Arnold to 'Börner' and is associated with the marker GF05-13., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 55 No. 2 (2016): Vitis

‘Heunisch Weiss’ (syn. ‘Gouais blanc’) contributed to a considerable increase of our varietal assortment, including renowned varieties like ‘Chardonnay’ and ‘Riesling Weiss’. Three phenotypic variants of ‘Heunisch Weiss’ were discovered in the grapevine collection at the JKI Institute for Grapevine Breeding Geilweilerhof: (a) ‘Heunisch Dreifarbig’ (three coloured ‘Heunisch’; VIVC prime name ‘Heunisch Dreifarbig’) expressing intense anthocyanin coloration on shoots, inflorescences and leaf petioles before fruit set and even red berry skin at fruit set stage; (b) ‘Pekasore’ (VIVC prime name ‘Heunisch Rotgestreift’; red striped ‘Heunisch’;) with rose to red stripes on white berries and (c) the stenospermocarpic ‘Aspirant’ (VIVC prime name ‘Heunisch Weiss Seedless’). Four cultivars proving to be homonymous in relation to ‘Heunisch’ were investigated at 24 loci to determine their identity or relatedness to ‘Heunisch Weiss’, respectively. ‘Heunisch Schwarz’ turned out to be a ‘Heunisch Weiss’ offspring. No parent offspring relationship was detected for ‘Heunisch Rot’, ‘Haenisch Rot’ = ‘Pamid’, and ‘Heunisch Blau’ . Ampelographic description was carried out for some of the accessions to trace back historical evidences. In addition five new ‘Heunisch Weiss’ offsprings were identified and confirmed by analysing 35 nuclear microsatellite loci. The accession ‘Furmint Apiren’ turned out to be a seedless bud mutant of the ‘Heunisch Weiss’ offspring ‘Iordan’., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 54 No. 2 (2015): Vitis

Somatic embryos originating from anther cultures of Vitis vinifera cvs Dornfelder, Muller-Thurgau and Riesling cultured on solid or in liquid medium were used for transformation via Agrobacterium tumefaciens strain LBA 4404. After two days of cocultivation the embryos proliferated in liquid NN69 medium containing kanamycin for selection and cefotaxim for removal of bacteria. Subsequent cultivation of larger embryos was carried out on solid NN69 medium supplemented with kanamycin. Highest conversion rates of selected germinated embryos to rooted plantlets were obtained from embryos of suspension cultures of Dornfelder and Riesling. Transgenic plants of both varieties were adapted to glasshouse and field conditions., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 39 No. 3 (2000): Vitis

Ampelographic investigations supported by molecular marker analysis were used to reevaluate the progenitors of the grapevine cv. Muller-Thurgau. From these studies we conclude Muller-Thurgau to be a descent of the offspring of a Riesling and Madeleine Royale (syn. Konigliche Magdalenentraube) hybridisation. The results reveal the importance of true to typeness of the grapevine varieties used for genotyping, parentage analyses, etc., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 39 No. 2 (2000): Vitis

The practical application of pyramiding resistance genes by the use of molecular markers was investigated in a F1 progeny derived from the cross of VHR 3082-1-42 x ‘Regent’. VHR 3082-1-42 is a cross between Muscadinia rotundifolia x Vitis vinifera, backcrossed another four times with V. vinifera (PAUQUET et al. 2001). It carries the Run1-gene which causes resistance to powdery mildew and the Rpv1-gene which is related to resistance against downy mildew. Both genes were introduced from Muscadinia rotundifolia (BOUQUET et al. 2000; WIEDEMANN-MERDINOGLU et al. 2006). ‘Regent’ is a new cultivar with quantitative resistance against downy and powdery mildew (EIBACH and TÖPFER 2003) released in Germany in 1996 for commercial use. 119 individuals of the F1 progeny were screened with a molecular marker for the Run1-gene (DONALD et al. 2002), with two SSR-markers for the Rpv1-gene (WIEDEMANN-MERDINOGLU et al. 2006) and with several markers from ‘Regent’ that showed good correlation to powdery and downy mildew resistance (ZYPRIAN et al. 2002, SALAKHUTDINOV et al. 2003, AKKURT 2004, FISCHER et al. 2004, AKKURT et al. 2007). Phenotypic evaluation for downy mildew resistance was done by artificial inoculation of leaf discs, and for powdery mildew by natural infection in a greenhouse. Comparison of the phenotypic data with the results of the molecular marker analyses showed a clear correlation between the degree of resistance and the presence of the resistance related alleles. According to the phenotypic data, 20 genotypes of the offspring were free of powdery and downy mildew infections. Based on a marker-assisted evaluation, out of these 20 genotypes a subset of four carried all the resistance related alleles for powdery and downy mildew indicating that resistance genes from both parents were effectively combined., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 46 No. 3 (2007): Vitis

We report detection of DNA polymorphisms in grapevine by the use of microsatellite-flanking primer pairs from soybean and rice. These “cross species” microsatellite-derived markers were checked for their inheritance patterns in controlled grapevine crosses. They produced multiple bands that segregated and can be scored as individual genetic markers of dominant type. Employed in genetic mapping studies they offer advantages such as improved reproducibility in comparison to commonly used multi-locus marker systems like RAPDs and AFLPs., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 45 No. 2 (2006): Vitis

The extraction of DNA is a basic tool for molecular analyses, which is difficult for grapevine due to its content of secondary metabolites. In terms of purity and yield, DNA extraction kits are superior; however, they are also expensive. Here we describe an efficient protocol to re-use the DNeasy 96 Plant Kit from Qiagen GmbH (Hilden, Germany) by preparing homemade buffers and regenerating the commercial 96 column plates. Leaf tissue extractions of different grapevine samples resulted in genomic DNA with a high molecular weight and sufficient purity suitable for molecular studies like restriction assays or various amplification analyses. This high throughput method is especially economical and does not require the use of laboratory robotics for pipetting steps., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 50 No. 1 (2011): Vitis

Organizing SSR markers located on one chromosome into PCR multiplexes has the potential to reduce the costs of marker analysis. The optimal selection strategies for such chromosome-wise multiplexes have not yet been investigated. We investigated with computer simulations three different selection strategies for gene introgression with a pseudo-backcross scheme and a marker density of one marker every 10 cM. Selecting individuals with the highest number of chromosomes carrying V. vinifera alleles at all background marker loci reduced the number of required multiplexes by 7.24-7.87 % in generations pBC4-pBC6 for population sizes nt = 150-300 individuals per pseudo-backcross generation., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 52 No. 4 (2013): Vitis

QTL-analysis (quantitative trait loci) and marker development rely on efficient phenotyping techniques. Objectivity and precision of a phenotypic data evaluation is crucial but time consuming. In the present study a high-throughput image interpretation tool was developed to acquire automatically number, size, and volume of grape berries from RGB (red-green-blue) images. Individual berries of one cluster were placed on a black construction (300 x 300 mm) to take a RGB image from the top. The image interpretation of one dataset with an arbitrary number of images runs automatically using the BAT (Berry-Analysis-Tool) developed in MATLAB. For validation of results, the number of berries was counted and their size was measured using a digital calliper. A measuring cylinder was used to determine reliably the berry volume by displacement of water. All placed berries could be counted by BAT 100 % correctly. Manual ratings compared with BAT ratings showed strong correlation of r = 0.96 for mean berry diameter/image and r = 0.98 for cluster volume., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 52 No. 3 (2013): Vitis

A set of 47 SNP (single nucleotide polymorphisms) markers (Cabezas et al. 2011) was tested for their usefulness to improve a genetic map from the cross of GF.GA‑52-42 x 'Solaris' previously established with SSR markers (Schwander et al. 2012). 55.3 % of the SNPs showed informative segregation and 26 SNP markers were localized on 16 of the 19 linkage groups of grapevine. Five chromosome regions with large gaps of recombining SSR markers could be equipped by positioning a SNP marker there. One SNP marker, VV10992, was found linked to the major resistance locus Rpv10 and should be applicable for marker-assisted selection., VITIS - Journal of Grapevine Research, Vol. 54 No. 1 (2015): Vitis

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