PCLM-D-22-00136

Climate warming erodes tropical reef habitat through frequency and intensity of episodic hypoxia

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Lucey,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Climate. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Cemal Turan, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

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Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

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Please make the recommended corrections on the M&S

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Climate does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: This study is exceptional in the planning, design, statistical analysis and findings. It is obvious that it was completed by a highly competent team of experts. I tried hard to provide suggestions for improvement but could only a few very minor items.

Line 404: Add ‘provided’ before ‘in the raw data sets. Also where can we find the raw data sets? Reference source here please.

Experimental details

How did you ensure to not break any arms when handling them? Just out of curiosity, nont needed in the paper.

Line 452: add a . after indiv

Line 501: sentence is missing something, maybe add ‘that’ before ‘was’ at end of the line?

Line 563: add a space before (8)

Line 749: Italicize O. Cinereum

Figure 2a. Y axis you can delete the two zeros and just keep the round number

Table S2. F column, right aign values

SI references, Bulletin is spelled wrong

Reviewer #2: First of all, the subject is extremely interesting and suitable for the journal. The data belong to two brittle star species obtained from in situ and laboratory environment were tried to be examined in the variability of temperature and oxygen parameters and tried to be associated with climate warming.

If it's not a bug with the reference system, moving the Material and Methods section between Introduction and Results is an important but simple fix.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Aylin Ulman

Reviewer #2: No

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: Reviewer_Lucy.docx

Climate warming erodes tropical reef habitat through frequency and intensity of episodic hypoxia

PCLM-D-22-00136R1

Dear Dr Lucey,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Climate warming erodes tropical reef habitat through frequency and intensity of episodic hypoxia' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Climate.

Before your manuscript can be formally accepted you will need to complete some formatting changes, which you will receive in a follow-up email from a member of our team. 

Please note that your manuscript will not be scheduled for publication until you have made the required changes, so a swift response is appreciated.

IMPORTANT: The editorial review process is now complete. PLOS will only permit corrections to spelling, formatting or significant scientific errors from this point onwards. Requests for major changes, or any which affect the scientific understanding of your work, will cause delays to the publication date of your manuscript.

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Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Climate.

Best regards,

Cemal Turan, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

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Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):