Sniffer-Cam Proves Shape of a Wine Glass Really Does Matter
[hdplay id=170 width=400 height=400] TOKYO, April 15 (UPI) — The sommelier who said you shouldn’t drink red wine out of a white wine glass may be a snob, but they’re not entirely wrong. New research proves the shape of a wine glass does affect how wine taste and smells.To prove as much, researchers developed a camera system to observe how the chemical profile of wine is altered as it exits different shapes.
The system featured a mesh strainer coated with alcohol oxidase, an enzyme that converts alcohols and oxygen into aldehydes and hydrogen peroxide. The mesh also featured horseradish peroxide and luminol so that the presence of hydrogen peroxide would initiate a color change.
The mesh was placed atop variously sized wine glasses as they were tipped to release the contents over the edge. A camera interpreted the chemical reactions and changing colors to map the concentration and distribution of ethanol as left each glass.
Researchers used their system to test a variety wines in three different glass shapes. They also tested each combination at a variety of temperature points. Different combinations produced different concentrations and distributions of ethanol — which can affect a taster’s ability to identify the subtleties of food flavors in a wine.
“We selected three types of glasses — a wine glass, a cocktail glass, and a straight glass — to determine the differences in ethanol emission caused by the shape effects of the glass,” researchers explained in their paper on the experiment, published in the journal Analyst.
Traditional wine glasses produced a distribution of wine concentrated around the rim of the glass, with less ethanol in the center.
