Phenolic Composition of Grape Stems from Different Spanish Varieties and Vintages

Grape stems are a by-product from the wine industry that has been underused to date despite having great potential for the agro-food and cosmetic industries. The aim of the present work was to characterize grape stem extracts obtained from different grape varieties from two vintages (2016 and 2018). Both spectrophotometric and chromatographic methods were used for sample characterization. The results showed that there exist significant differences in antioxidant activity, total phenolic content (TPC) and total flavonoid content (TF) among grape stems from different varieties in each vintage and from different vintage for the same variety. Catechin was the most abundant phenolic compound in all extracts from both vintages. In general, Mazuelo presented higher concentration values of the different phenolic compounds than Garnacha and Tempranillo. It was observed than extreme temperatures and accumulated precipitations, which were higher in the 2016 vintage, had an impact on the polyphenol synthesis. Therefore, grape stems from the 2018 vintage presented higher TPC and TF values than their counterparts from the 2016 vintage. In addition, the statistical analysis revealed that the influence of environmental factor such as light, temperature and precipitations have different impact on the synthesis of polyphenols depending on the family of the specific compound.