Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Scientia Horticulturae journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/scihorti Original full paper Eﬀects of irrigation over three years on the amino acid composition of Albariño (Vitis vinifera L) musts and wines in two diﬀerent terroirs Yolanda Bouzas-Cid a,b , Emilia Díaz-Losada a , Emiliano Trigo-Córdoba a , Elena Falqué b , Ignacio Orriols a,c , Teresa Garde-Cerdán d , José M. Mirás-Avalos a,1, ⁎ a Estación de Viticultura e Enoloxía de Galicia (EVEGA-INGACAL), Ponte San Clodio s/n, 32428 Leiro, Ourense Spain b Depto Química Analítica, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidade de Vigo, As Lagoas s/n, 32004 Ourense Spain c Servizo de Prevención e Análise de Riscos, Dirección Xeral de Innovación e Industrias Agrarias e Forestais, Rúa Roma 25-27, 15703 Santiago de Compostela Spain d Instituto de Ciencias de la Vid y del Vino (CSIC-CAR-UR), Finca La Grajera, Ctra. de Burgos Km. 6, 26007 Logroño Spain ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Nitrogen compounds Ripening Climate conditions Water supply ABSTRACT Amino acids and ammonium are the main nitrogen sources for Saccharomyces cerevisiae and are necessary for the correct development of the alcoholic fermentation. These compounds are aroma precursors and, therefore, variations in their concentrations may inﬂuence wine quality. Irrigation might alter amino acid concentrations in grapes. In this context, the eﬀect of irrigation on the amino acid proﬁles of the white grapevine (Vitis vinifera L.) variety Albariño was studied over three consecutive vintages (2012, 2013 and 2014). The experiment was carried out in two vineyards included in two diﬀerent Appellation of Origin (AOC) in NW Spain. Arginine was the most abundant amino acid found in Albariño musts. Irrigation did not alter the total concentration of amino acids in the must, but it did on certain amino acids, especially methionine. Wines from the diﬀerent treatments showed similar concentrations of amino acids, except in 2013. Vintage had a strong eﬀect on the amino acid content in musts, likely related to weather conditions. 1. Introduction Amino acids are essential for yeast growth and development during alcoholic fermentation (Bell and Henschke, 2005). The nitrogen composition of grapes, and therefore musts, not only aﬀects fermenta- tion development but also the production of aromatic compounds, due to the role that some amino acids play as aroma precursors (Hernández- Orte et al., 2002; Garde-Cerdán and Ancín-Azpilicueta, 2008). In fact, the formation of volatile compounds (higher alcohols, fatty acids and esters) is related to amino acids metabolism. Thus, amino acids such as leucine, isoleucine, valine, and phenylalanine are precursors of aro- matic compounds such as isoamyl and amyl alcohols (called as isoamyl alcohols), isobutanol and 2-phenylethanol, respectively (Styger et al., 2011). Must amino acids composition is inﬂuenced by many factors, including berry maturity degree, grape variety, climate conditions and nitrogen fertilization (Souﬂeros et al., 2003; Bell and Henschke, 2005; Lee and Schreiner, 2010; Garde-Cerdán et al., 2014). However, the inﬂuence of irrigation on the amino acids composition of grapes and musts has not been thoroughly studied. Previous research on white and red grapevine varieties (Garde-Cerdán et al., 2009; Ortega-Heras et al., 2014), reported that irrigation increased the accumulation of amino acids in the berry. Albariño is the most important white grapevine variety from Galicia and north of Portugal, and its production has recently extended to other European countries and even to the United States of America and Australia. In Galicia, it is mainly cultivated in the Rías Baixas Appellation of Origin (AOC), which is the region with the world’s greatest surface devoted to this variety, but it is also cultivated in the AOC Ribeiro and, in Portugal, in the AOC Vinho Verde, especially in Monçao and Melgaço. Albariño wines are characterised by a high aromatic proﬁle (Versini et al., 1994), with fruity and ﬂoral odours. Due to its importance, several authors have studied the aromatic proﬁle of this variety (Falqué et al., 2001; Cortés et al., 2003; Falqué et al., 2008; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scienta.2017.05.005 Received 12 December 2016; Received in revised form 10 April 2017; Accepted 2 May 2017 ⁎ Corresponding author at: Estación de Viticultura e Enoloxía de Galicia (EVEGA-INGACAL), Ponte San Clodio s/n, 32428 Leiro, Ourense Spain. 1 Current address: Departamento de Riego, Centro de Edafología y Biología Aplicada del Segura (CEBAS-CSIC), Campus Universitario de Espinardo, 30100 Espinardo, Murcia Spain E-mail addresses: jose.manuel.miras.avalos@xunta.es, jmmiras@cebas.csic.es, josemanuelmiras@gmail.com (J.M. Mirás-Avalos). Abbreviations: ALB, Albariño; DEEMM, diethyl ethoxymethylenemalonate; AOC, Appellation of Origin; ET c , crop evapotranspiration; ET 0 , potential evapotranspiration; HPLC, High- Performance Liquid Chromatography; IS, Internal Standard; LOD, Limit of Detection; LOQ, Limit of Quantiﬁcation; PCA, Principal Component Analysis; PC, Principal Component; UV, Ultraviolet; Ar, arginine; GABA, aminobutyric acid; Thr, threonine; Ala, alanine; Ser, serine; Glu, glutamine; Glu acid, glutamic acid; Val, valine; Phe, phenylalanine; Leu, leucine; His, histidine; Asp acid, aspartic acid; Ile, isoleucine; Try, tryptophan; Tyr, tyrosine; Asp, asparagine; Lys, lysine; Cys, cysteine; Pro, proline; Gly, glycine; Orn, ornithine; Met, methionine Scientia Horticulturae xxx (xxxx) xxx–xxx 0304-4238/ © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Please cite this article as: Bouzas-Cid, Y., Scientia Horticulturae (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scienta.2017.05.005