PONE-D-21-03199

Removal of organic contaminants from wastewater with GO/MOFs composites

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Wei,

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Yogendra Kumar Mishra, Ph. D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately 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: No

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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 ONE 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: In this manuscript, synthesis, characterization and organic contaminants removal performance of GO/MOFs composite is described. The methodology and applications presented in the manuscript are interesting and will appeal to a broader readership of Plos One. The manuscript is recommended for publication subjected to addressing following comments:

1. GO/MOFs first explained then abbreviation should be used.

2. The introduction section needs to be modified as the discussion appears to be more scattered in nature.

3. To gain the porous parameters (e. g. the specific surface area, total pore volume, the surface area and pore volume of the microspores), N2 adsorption-desorption experiments for GO/MOFs are suggested to supply.

4. Proper characterization of GO like XRD, SEM and Raman should be included.

5. The dye absorption behavior, suggesting authors use commercial activated carbon as the benchmark; and evaluate the absorption efficiency of these GO/MOFs composite.

6. The cycle performance of the adsorbent is suggested to be checked.

7. The English should be carefully polished. Also, many format problems should be addressed.

8. The quality of ALL OF FIGURES should be further decorated. The following literature should be consulted and employed: Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 2020, 27, 32874–32887; ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 2019, 11, 18165-18177; ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 2019, 11, 43949-43963.

Reviewer #2: The manuscript entitiled “Removal of organic contaminantsfrom wastewater with GO/MOFscomposites” submitted by Fuhua Wei et al is an nice submission regarding Environmental sciences. The idea , concept and the methodology of the manuscript is novel as well as well defined however the manuscript needs to be corrected before acceptance. The comments are :

1. Please use full form of abbreviation when using first time in the manuscript. What is MOF means here?

2. Line 35-39, meaning is unclear with grammatical mistakes. Rephrase it.

3. Author has mentioned many times about the toxicity of the previous materials in introduction. They need to be clear with statement about the biological toxicity with proper citations. In general, toxicity applied to the biological toxicity of materials, metals or dyes to the living cells present in environmental sources. Author should focus also in this issue in the introduction. Some suggested citations are mentioned in the last comment.

4. Introduction should also mention, what is the need of the new material and what is the hypothesis of synthesis of this new material.

5. Why Zr and Fe? Any specific properties which led to better environmental application? Mention in introduction.

6. It will be better if, author can present the mechanism mentioned in the result and discussion section through a schematic diagram.

7. Lastly authors are suggested to cite some recent articles about the metal toxicity in environment. Some of the suggested one are: DOI: 10.1039/C7RA05943D, https://doi.org/10.1093/toxsci/kfx204, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msec.2018.07.037,https://doi.org/10.1080/21691401.2018.1503598 , DOI: 10.1016/j.msec.2021.111888 , DOI: 10.1016/j.bioorg.2020.104535 , DOI: 10.2217/nnm-2020-0138, DOI: 10.1016/j.mtchem.2020.100299; DOI: 10.1016/j.mtchem.2020.100345; https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.7b01522, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcis.2018.07.020 , DOI: 10.1016/j.envpol.2020.115482

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Removal of organic contaminants from wastewater with GO/MOFs composites

PONE-D-21-03199R1

Dear Dr. Wei,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

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Kind regards,

Yogendra Kumar Mishra, Ph. D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

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. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

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?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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

**********

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

PLOS ONE 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: the authors have addressed all the comments and made the revision properly.The manuscript can be recommended for acceptance.

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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.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No