THE VARIABILITY OF THE ANTIOXIDANT CAPACITY OF RED WINES IN RELATION WITH GRAPEVINE VARIETY

The red wine is one of the foods rich in antioxidants, compounds that protect the organisms against the destructive action of the free radicals on the health. In this context, for the promotion of wines on markets, an identification of the wines assortments with high antioxidant capacity should be achieved. The present study, performed during 2012? 2014 period, at Research and Development Institute for Viticulture and Enology Valea Calugareasca, aimed to define the antioxidant capacity of the wines made from 11 grapevine varieties belonging to the three groups of wines assortments and to make a correlation of the antioxidant capacity with the phenolic potential of the grapes and wines. Depending on the period when the grapevine variety was created, an old wine assortment, a current and a newly created one can be differentiated. The antioxidant capacity of the wine was performed by means the TEAC method, the phenolic potential of the grapes by Glories method and the phenolic composition of the wines by OIV spectrophotometric methods. The data processing was realized by using the Regression and correlation analysis. The obtained results showed that the varieties 'Negru aromat', 'Novac' and 'Olivia' are characterized by a high antioxidant capacity, the group formed by 'Feteasca neagra', 'Pinot noir' and 'Merlot' showed a medium antioxidant capacity. The lowest values of the antioxidant capacity were registered in the case of 'Negru moale', 'Negru vartos', 'Blauerzweigelt' and 'Burgund' mare varieties. The antioxidant capacity of the wines was closely correlated with the following parameters of the phenolic potential of the raw material: total polyphenols, extractable anthocyanins, tannins originated from seeds and the maturity of the seeds.