Creating Tomorrow's Grapevine Varieties with Today's Tools

Grapevine cultivation in Europe faces high pesticide use, climate change impacts, and market competition. To address these challenges, the project aims to develop new Vitis vinifera cultivars with improved organoleptic properties and durable resistance to downy and powdery mildew. It combines marker‐assisted selection for monogenic traits with genomic selection and association genetics to predict and select complex polygenic traits. Additionally, it investigates a dwarfing approach to shorten generational turnover. Leveraging the Vassal genetic repository, complete genome sequences, and genotyping‐by‐sequencing technologies, the work defines breeding strategies that accelerate the development of elite grapevine genotypes.