Sulfite Management during Vinification and Impact on the Flavor of Solaris Wine

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Please see the attachment for review comments.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

List of changes in response to the points raised by the reviewers.

Torben Bo Toldam-Andersen, UCPH 22 March 2024

Track and trace is used in the document.

Reviewer 1 point 1:

A few modifications have been made to the introduction in order to enhance the aspects of the sulfite management, which is addressed, and to enhance the connection in content from section to section. The authors find that especially the last section in the introduction sufficiently describes the background central for the initiation and importance of the study.

Reviewer 1, point 2:

In section 2.4 more details regarding purge volumes have been given (line 130 and 145-147) to describe the difference between the methodology used for acetaldehyde and other volatile compounds.

Reviewer 1, Results and Discussion

Comparative discussion points have been added (line 201-202, 246-248)

Reviewer 1, point 3:

Two examples of relevant pathways are mentioned in line 196-199

Reviewer 1, point 4:

The section is summarized in line 276-279 giving reference to the following section, in which a sentence about linalool is added (line 329-330).

Reviewer 1 point 4.2: “3.5 Effect of SO2 Management on Sensory Properties in Final Wines (12 Months of Storage)”: The authors may consider associating the sensory properties with the results of the volatile compounds measured above. The authors believe that this is already done to the extent that it is possible - see line 334-338 and 342-346.

Reviewer point 5: Conclusions

We have underlined the importance of the expected life span of the wine for the determination of an adequate sulfite addition pre bottling. Also the benefit of even a minimum of sulfite is underlined.

We find it difficult to give more specific guidelines for the industry in a short conclusion. In specific cases a range of factors beyond the scope of this paper also need to be taken into account such as the importance of pH and storage conditions as well as differences in wine styles.

Reviewer point 6: reference format:

We have carefully gone through the list and only identified the need of a few minor corrections which have been made.  

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors of this article present for the first time the evolution of aromatic compounds as a function of the dose of sulphur dioxide added at different times during winemaking and at different concentrations. The experimental design is correct and the sensory analysis part is carried out accurately and precisely. However, some minor changes should be made to improve certain aspects of the manuscript. Given the above, I consider that this manuscript can be accepted for publication after minor revision.

The aspects to be revised are detailed below:

The title should not contain the concept SO2, it would be advantageous if it were the full name for indexing purposes.

Regarding section 2.2, in relation to the methodology, several issues need to be solved:

1) Information should be added on how the different harvesting tasks were carried out: Harvesting, transport, pressing, whether racking was carried out, etc.

2) Was the concentration of viable biomass monitored during the fermentation process?

3) Was it possible to check the % of implantation of the inoculated yeast strain for alcoholic fermentation?

4) How can the authors be sure that the non-Saccharomyces yeast strains naturally present in the grape must have not carried out fermentation, at least in the early stages of this process?

L. 117: Outlined by who?

L. 218: the apostrophe in the Latinism “et al”. I consider that this is not appropriate and should be deleted. The same applies to lines 237 and 239.

Please adjust the format of the title of paragraph 3.3.

L.246: revise style of citation

L 252: "p" should always appear in italics when referring to p-value.

In relation to the results, in the case of table 2, if replications have been carried out, the results should be shown as the mean with the associated standard deviation. It would be beneficial for the quality of the manuscript if these data were also treated statistically to show whether there are significant differences between the different compounds and treatments applied.

English Language is fine. Minor spell check and grammar is required

Author Response

List of changes in response to the points raised by the reviewers.

Torben Bo Toldam-Andersen, UCPH 22 March 2024

Track and trace is used in the document.

Reviewer 2:

• ‘SO2’ has been replaced by ‘Sulfite’ in the title

Section 2.2.

• Information should be added on how the different harvesting tasks were carried out: Harvesting, transport, pressing, whether racking was carried out, etc.

Further details have been added.

• Was the concentration of viable biomass monitored during the fermentation process? No it was not monitored. We monitored the progress of fermentation by density.
• Was it possible to check the % of implantation of the inoculated yeast strain for alcoholic fermentation? No it was not checked.
• How can the authors be sure that the non-Saccharomyces yeast strains naturally present in the grape must have not carried out fermentation, at least in the early stages of this process? We can not be sure. However, we do not see it as a major issue in the specific experiment and to minimize a possible unwanted impact of non-sacc. we on purpose chose to use the DV10 yeast. It is a strong yeast, which we know is fast to initiate and dominate the fermentation. It is also chosen as it is relatively neutral in its aroma impact on the wine. To pasteurize the juice in order to avoid any wild yeast, we find would have been more problematic. The method used here is close to the normal industry practice.

1. 117: Outlined by who?

Names added.

239. 218: the apostrophe in the Latinism “et al”. I consider that this is not appropriate and should be deleted. The same applies to lines 237 and 239.

Corrections made.

Please adjust the format of the title of paragraph 3.3.

The format has been changed.

L.246: revise style of citation 

We are uncertain about what was the problem here but have modified the citation and hope is done in a satisfactory manor now.

L 252: "p" should always appear in italics when referring to p-value.

The format have been adjusted.

Table 2:

The authors find that adding standard deviations to the table would make it less transparent. Instead, we have added letters from Student’s posthoc tests to show which values are significantly different. This gives similar information.

Furthermore, a wrong reference was given below the table (pherobase.com). It has been corrected to www.thegoodscentscompany.com.

There are many references given in the footnote to the table 2, which refer to sources of odor threshold value (OTV). We find them necessary to include, as the OTV are important in order for us to identify which changes in compounds are likely to influence the sensory properties of the wines.