Trace Element and Rare Earth Element Profiles in Berry Tissues of Three Grape Cultivars

Abstract

Mineral elements play an important role in the geographic traceability of wine, and understanding mineral element profiles in berry tissues helps to determine the relationship between elemental accumulation and regional flavor formation in grapes and wine. Eighteen trace elements and 15 rare earth elements were investigated in the skin, pulp, and seeds of grape cultivars Cabernet Sauvignon, Marselan, and Italian Riesling using inductively coupled plasma–mass spectrometry (ICP–MS). Most trace elements, except for B, Zr, Tl, and U, presented similar tissue-specific distributions in their concentrations in the order of seeds > skin > pulp, but concentrations varied within the three cultivars. The two red cultivars showed significantly higher concentrations of Cu, Cr, Ba, Mo, Cd, Ga, Ge, and Tl and lower concentrations of B, Mn, Sr, and U than the white cultivar Italian Riesling. However, the tissue distribution of rare earth elements was totally different from that of the trace elements. In Italian Riesling berries, concentrations of most rare earth elements in the skin were greater than or similar to those in the seeds and pulp, except that Yb was not detected. For the two red cultivars, concentrations of 11 rare earth elements (Y, La, Ce, Nd, Pr, Sm, Gd, Dy, Ho, Er, and Yb) in the seeds were not as high as those in the skin and pulp. These findings give new insights into the tissue distribution of trace and rare earth elements in white and red grape cultivars.