Anthocyanins degradation mediated by β-glycosidase contributes to the color loss during alcoholic fermentation in a structure-dependent manner

Anthocyanins deteriorate during fermentation to varying degrees depending on the structure of the anthocyanin, thus affecting the sensory quality of the wine, and the degradation of anthocyanins is closely associated with the beta-glycosidase. In this study, the alcoholic fermentation systems containing cyanidin-3-O-glucoside (C3G), peonidin-3-O-glucoside (Pn3G), delphinidin-3-O-glucoside (D3G), petunidin-3-O-glucoside (Pt3G), and malvidin-3-O-glucoside (M3G) incubated for eight days. Our results indicated that the color of the systems containing different anthocyanins saw significant and dissimilar changes during fermentation, in relation to anthocyanin degradation. The five anthocyanins showed varying degradation degrees, which are relevant to the beta-glycosidase produced by yeast. Enzyme kinetics and molecular docking analysis showed the affinity between anthocyanins and beta-glucosidase: C3G < M3G < Pn3G < Pt3G < D3G. This study demonstrated that beta-glycosidase had distinct effects on anthocyanins with diverse structures, resulting in different color changes in fermentation systems. It provided a potential strategy for sensory quality improvement during the fermentation of fruit wines rich in anthocyanins.