The 10th edition of this quadrennial enology symposium was held at the Palais de la Bourse in Bordeaux from June 29 to July 1, 2015.

This Symposium International d’Œnologie de Bordeaux was first conceived in 1963 by Prof. Jean Ribéreau-Gayon and Dr. Émile Peynaud to commemorate the centennial anniversary of Louis Pasteur’s famous work Études sur le vin. The event is a gathering of the enology community bringing together luminaries and young researchers and PhD students, giving them the opportunity to present their latest work in the fields of viticulture, microbiology, wine chemistry and sensorial analysis.

Presentations, workshops and poster sessions demonstrated how much we have learned about wine but how much more we still have to learn. Several new molecules are being detected and identified, which inevitably spawn new studies to understand the quality and sensorial impacts and possibly health impacts. For example, PhD student Liming Zeng reported identifying a new group of tetramer procyanidins (tannins), which she named “crown procyanidins,” found in red wines. And Axel Marchal, a researcher known for his work trying to identify the origins of non-sugar sweet tastes in dry wines, further elucidated sweet vs bitter tastes from quercotriterpenosides (QTT) found in oak wood. But in spite of this progress, enology research ostensibly remains a very challenging field.

Another highlight and confirmation for me was how wine quality is perceived so differently based on visual cues and other information. Wines can be rated dramatically differently when tasted blindfolded vs being presented the bottle/label, and even more so once price is factored in.

All in all it was a great symposium with a highlight dinner at Château La Louvière in spite of the unusual sweltering heat hitting a high of 41C (106F). Fortunately, Bordeaux has a lot of good beers to offer aside from their spectacular wines.

See you all in Bordeaux in 2019 for the 11th edition of the symposium.

Daniel