Tim Hearden The National Grape Research Alliance is targeting needs for further study involving multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, multi-state collaboration on topics that no single grape sector could adequately address on its own. Genetics and grapevine improvement, natural resources and environment are among focus areas. In many respects, last year was one of charred vines and broken dreams where reality pummeled optimism. “The 2020 harvest had both a literal and a figurative cloud over it,” wrote Donnell Brown, President of the National Grape Research Alliance. “When so much is uncertain and with so much at stake, it can be hard to see the path ahead. But that’s why research exists --- to solve the problems we have today with the innovations of tomorrow.”