RESEARCH & WINE: WILL THE “BOTTLE DETECTOR” END WINE SCAMS? THE NEW METHOD TO REVEAL FALSE WINES HAS ARRIVED FROM RESEARCHERS IN FRANCE

Decanter magazine recently revealed that a technique has been created to unmask fake wines. It is the latest novelty by French researchers, in collaboration with “Antique Wine Company”, the British company specialized in the sale of fine wines. The method is based on the same logic that reveals fakes in the art world: using a particle accelerator the amount of radiation emitted by a bottle can be measured when placed under an ion beam.

The most interesting part is that the bottle does not have to be opened to verify its authenticity, thus the wine is controlled without any disturbances. The radiation is directed at the glass, whose chemical composition changes over time, also depending on where it was originally made. The results of the test, compared with date from an informational database on over 80 bottles from the 1800’s to the present, are very encouraging.

The project does have a drawback however: one of the most often used methods for counterfeiting fine wines consists of filling an authentic bottle with “fake” wine. The “bottle detector”, in this case, is useless. But to avoid this risk, the Antique Wine Company is planning to combine the test with another method that is already in use, which consists of using a spectrometer to verify of the quantity of cesium 137 in wine, which varies according to its vintage. The only problem with this test is that it can only be used for wines made after the 1950’s or after the period when cesium was largely released due to nuclear explosions.

These are not the only methods that exist, however, to safeguard against wine scams and more continue to be developed.