1. The isotope database, a European asset

Every year, each wine-producing member country of the European Union is required to produce an isotope database (IDB) to characterize its production . This database is a yearly fingerprint of the isotopic distribution of each wine-growing area. By extension, these reference values can also be used to verify the authenticity of a vintage, as well as the geographical origin of a wine.

Figure 1 shows three concrete cases of commercial wines suspected of adulteration. For these three examples, the châteaux made the authentic samples available...