Wine genomics project aims to enhance output of Canadian wine producers

Collaboration with US and New Zealand

Genome BC is assisting the province's wine making industry with an international research collaboration to develop tools for enhancing the cultivation, processing and fermentation of wine-making grapes at the molecular and biochemical level. The public-private collaboration involves Canada, New Zealand and the US and is budgeted at $5 million over three years, making it one of the smaller large-scale projects Genome BC has undertaken.

Entitled WineGen, the project builds on technology development achieved through the previous GrapeGen project, which was undertaken in conjunction with Genome Espana (R$, January 28/04). It also achieves Genome BC's aim of significantly leveraging provincial funding which is provided to ensure that projects conform to provincial economic and social priorities.

"This project is very much in line with our overall strategy. It's an applied project and we're keen to do as much of this as we can," says Dr Pierre Meulien, Genome BC's chief scientific officer. "It also resonates with a key economic sector of BC … It has strong collaboration with end users – the wine growers and wine makers – which is an important part of the project."

WineGen is led by Dr Hennie van Vuuren and Steve Lund from UBC's Wine Research Centre and Dr Richard Gardner from the Univ of Aukland. The US component of the project will be led by Dr Terrence van Rooyen from the US Department of Agriculture. BC researchers will focus on the Pinot Noir and Gewurztraminer varieties while New Zealand researchers are targeting the Sauvignon Blanc variety.

WineGen plans to utilize genomics methods to identify genes associated with specific compositional traits in grapevine production. Genomic and proteomic approaches will be used to help explain the cellular response of yeast strains during the fermentation process and the effects of manipulating the fermentation process on wine aroma and flavour. One major aim will be to develop hand-held devices which can be used in the field and production facilities.

The Univ of British Columbia will be the primary site of the project's research and intellectual property will belong to the project while inventions flow to the institution. Genome BC will not receive any IP but expects some level of return on investment if and when financial benefits are realized.

"This project is more applied than the Espana (Grape Gen) collaboration. The research is more near term so that we expect applications in a fewer number of years than genomics and health care and can apply them pretty quickly in the field," says Meulien. "These tools will be used to help growers know when to harvest and follow fermentation and products while maturing. The consumer will ultimately be able to pick and choose which is the best."

Wine is a $4-billion industry in Canada with BC accounting for about one quarter of the total. Despite major improvements in Canadian wine in recent years, the process of growing grapes and producing wine is an inherently risky biological process. WineGen plans to reduce the level of risk by introducing tools and methodologies.

"We plan to de-risk the biological process which is fraught with uncertainty at the moment," says Meulien. "Wine makers will want to have trust in these molecular tests so there's lots of validation to ensure that they are robust and reproducible."

WineGen also has a social science and humanities component, in line with all genomics projects in Canada and elsewhere. This aspect of the project is led by Dr Michael Howlett at Simon Fraser Univ and will evaluate interactions between the wine industry in terms of regulation and adoption. Howlett will also examine interactions between industry, science, policy makers and the public.

"This is very important to us. As we bring new genomics technologies closer to the field and they move close to application a dialogue needs to happen," says Meulien. "It will focus on the perception of consumers and growers. Some people believe new technologies are not exactly kosher."

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