PCLM-D-22-00174

Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Truong,

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.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Feb 16 2023 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at climate@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pclm/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Oleg Askeyev, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

Journal Requirements:

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

The study in manuscript "Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress" is a presented and interesting research of poorly studied understanding of physiological changes while quails are transitioning to heat stress and when quails are chronically exposed to mild heat stress. By my opinion recieving authors results can help to the continuation of poultry production during temperature increase in global scale.

Overall, the authors have done a good job in manuscript. However, I still have major concerns regarding style of writing and it is the reason why I wrote in short review that the “manuscript could be accepted for publication following a significant revision".

My short review

The article is exceptionally poorly illustrated. I would recommend authors to significantly change the style of presentation of drawings.

The writing style of the introduction is very voluminous and long. Which is not typical for academic journals. Please change.

Statistical methods are exceptionally poorly described. Please need details.

Based on your big data, it would be worth while in the discussion to reflect a more realistic picture of not only quails but a wider range of bird species affected by high temperatures. In general, the discussion is written in a very mechanical way and does not reflect the comparison of your results with the results of other scientists. Weakly presented reasoning in the deep context of your results with others.

Because of this, the article looks like a technical report.

I encourage the authors to resubmit a revised version of their manuscript because their database is important and the scientific contribution of this work could be significant.

Based on the reviews received, I feel that your manuscript could be reconsidered for publication should you be prepared to incorporate major revisions.

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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: Partly

Reviewer #2: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: No

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)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

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: Manuscript "Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress" is valuable information for agricultural management in conditions rapidly changing climate. Manuscript written in good English. This ms may be publication in this journal provided that all deficiencies are corrected.

I have a number of comments and suggestions:

«Abstract»

Currently Abstract contains more words than is possible according to Submission Guidelines. Please shorten it but add one short sentence about statistical analysis.

«Introduction»

1. The introduction is heavily overloaded with redundant information, it can be shortened

2. Please be careful with the terms "climate" and "weather". They contain much more than just a change in temperature. Ignoring other environmental factors (which are also changing very quickly) can lead to a distortion of ideas about future changes.

«Materials and methods»

«Statistical analysis»

It is necessary to describe in more detail all the procedures of statistical analysis. Please indicate all the programs that were used in the calculations and graphic visualizations (figures)

«Results»

«p-value». Please change the p-value according to Submission Guidelines. For example, lines 235, 267, 268, 287, etc. contain redundant zero. p < 0.001 is sufficient (according to Submission Guidelines)

«Tables»

The phrase “All data were presented as means ± SE where appropriate” is not entirely clear if the authors used mean values presented with standard deviations (SD) in most tables and figures.

«Figures»

For a better understanding of readers and a visual illustration of the results, it would be nice to make a few more colored figures.

Reviewer #2: The article "Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress" is of current interest.

I have the following comments:

1. Abstract word limit exceeded.

2. The introduction is too big. It is desirable to shorten the text.

3. It is desirable to improve the quality of the graphs.

4. The chapter Material and methodology: describe statistical methods of data analysis in more detail.

The article can be accepted for publication after the proposed changes have been made.

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6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress

PCLM-D-22-00174R1

Dear Dr Linda Truong,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Changes in Japanese quail (Coturnix coturnix japonica) blood gases and electrolytes in response to multigenerational heat stress' 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.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact climate@plos.org.

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

Best regards,

Sejian Veerasamy, MVSc & PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

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Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. 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)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. 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

**********

6. 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: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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