DAVIS, Calif., March 9, 2020…The American Society for Enology and Viticulture’s (ASEV) Board of Directors has selected the winners of the 2020 Best Paper Awards. Authors will be presenting their research papers at the Joint 71^st ASEV National Conference and 45^th ASEV Eastern Section Annual Meeting on June 15-18 in Portland, Oregon.

The 2020 Best Viticulture Paper titled “Elimination of the Crown Gall Pathogen, Agrobacterium vitis, from Systematically Infected Grapevines by Tissue Culture” is by Luz Marcela Yepes, Tom Burr, Cherie Reid and Marc Fuchs from Cornell University’s School of Integrative Plant Science. The study concluded that the elimination of Agrobacterium vitis, a serious global grapevine disease, was achieved from severely infected Vitis vinifera cv. Riesling vines by culturing buds and meristems from shoot tips of greenhouse-grown plants followed by micropropagation in tissue culture. Read more about this study by clicking here. Dr. Marc Fuchs will be presenting the paper at the joint conference.

For the 2020 Best Enology Paper, ASEV selected “Distribution of Yeast Cells, Temperature, and Fermentation By-Products in White Wine Fermentations,” by Mira Schwinn, Dominik Durner, Antonio Delgado and Ulrich Fischer from Dienstleistungszentrum Ländlicher Raum (DLR) Rheinpfalz, Institute for Viticulture and Oenology in Germany. The authors concluded that the practice of yeast inoculation from the top of the fermentation tank without stirring had a larger-than-expected effect on fermentation kinetics in low turbidity juice. Read more about this study by clicking here. Dr. Dominik Durner will present this paper in June.

Each year, the ASEV Best Paper Awards Committee evaluates all manuscripts published in the American Journal of Enology and Viticulture (AJEV) during the previous year and selects one paper in viticulture and one in enology that reflect outstanding research and a substantial contribution to the field. The current Best Paper Award Committee includes Tom Collins (Chair) of Washington State University, Tri-Cities; Robert Coleman of Chateau St. Jean, California; Scott Dwyer of Chemeketa Community College, Oregon; Lindsay Jordan of Trace Genomics, California; Kevin Ker of Brock University, Canada; Russell Moss of Cornell University, New York; Merilark Padgett-Johnson of Santa Rosa Junior College, California; Joe Shirley of Trinchero Family Estates, California; and David Sorokowsky of California.

The authors will be presented with a plaque and monetary award at the 71^st Joint ASEV National Conference and 45^th ASEV Eastern Section Annual Meeting on June 15-18 in Portland, Oregon. Both papers are highlighted on www.ajevonline.org and are available free of charge.

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