Abstract
Proanthocyanidins (PAs) are important secondary metabolites crucial for the quality of grape berry and wine. Despite important advances in our understanding of the structural and regulatory genes involved in the PAs biosynthesis pathway, our knowledge about the details of biosynthetic and regulatory networks, especially the mechanism of polymerization and transportation remains limited. We provided an overview of the latest discoveries related to the mechanisms of grape PAs structure, astringency properties, detection methods, biosynthesis and transportation. We also summarized the environmental influencing factors of PAs synthesis in grape. Future trends were discussed.
Disclosure statement
The authors declare that they do not have any conflict of interest.
Author contributions
YL Fang and XY Sun conceived and designed this critical revision. XF Wei studied the available information and wrote the manuscript. YL Ju, TT Ma and JX Zhang modified the format and improved the language.