PONE-D-21-24120Reproducibility of knee extensor and flexor contraction velocity in healthy men and women assessed using tensiomyography: A study protocolPLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does the manuscript provide a valid rationale for the proposed study, with clearly identified and justified research questions?

The research question outlined is expected to address a valid academic problem or topic and contribute to the base of knowledge in the field.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Is the protocol technically sound and planned in a manner that will lead to a meaningful outcome and allow testing the stated hypotheses?

The manuscript should describe the methods in sufficient detail to prevent undisclosed flexibility in the experimental procedure or analysis pipeline, including sufficient outcome-neutral conditions (e.g. necessary controls, absence of floor or ceiling effects) to test the proposed hypotheses and a statistical power analysis where applicable. As there may be aspects of the methodology and analysis which can only be refined once the work is undertaken, authors should outline potential assumptions and explicitly describe what aspects of the proposed analyses, if any, are exploratory.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Is the methodology feasible and described in sufficient detail to allow the work to be replicable?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

********** 

4. Have the authors described where all data underlying the findings will be made available when the study is complete?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception, at the time of publication. 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

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6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above and, if applicable, provide comments about issues authors must address before this protocol can be accepted for publication. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about research or publication ethics.

You may also provide optional suggestions and comments to authors that they might find helpful in planning their study.

(Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: General comment

Thank you for your thesis. Your research is very useful in establishing the reliability of TMG's methods. This study will be to investigate the within and between-day reliability of five different formulas to calculate Vc. The second aim will be to investigate the effect of different ISI during repeated stimulation on Vc, assessed by the example of M. biceps femoris and M. rectus femoris. However, there are some concerns that you should modify. Please refer following comments.

Line 107

Please explain the reason of selection in muscle (RF and BF) for your study.

Line 127

Please describe the location (setting) of your planned research.

Line 134

The description of IPAC-SF should be combined with the inclusion criteria of line129.

Line 141

When RF and BF are first mentioned, please use the formal names.

Line 142

Why will you perform your study with ten stimuli? Please add the reason the number of the stimuli in method.

Line 195

Please consider whether you will measure the thickness of the skin or subcutaneous tissue at the TMG measurement point. This may affect the measurement.

Reviewer #2: General comments:

This study protocol aims to investigate the reliability of Tensiomyography derived velocity calculations, the effect of inter-stimulus interval on velocity of contraction in the rectus femoris and biceps femoris. Overall, this study protocol is well written, with robust methodological considerations. This study protocol will benefit both practitioners and researchers to standardise which velocity of contraction equation, and inter-stimulus interval to use. This study could benefit from using normalised response speed (Vrn), which is a much more manageable and easier to interpret metric.

Specific comments:

Rewording a few sentences and phrases might make it easier for the flow of the manuscript.

Introduction:

Line 52 – electrochemical signal of the nervous system, and/or artificial electrical stimulation of the muscles (e.g., electrical stimulator).

Line 58 – consider adding the following sentence instead “skeletal muscle stiffness, morphological, and structural changes”

Line 71 – wouldn’t the line of slope be what time of contraction (Tc) measures? Please explain further.

Line 73 – add “exists” after consensus

Line 84 – perhaps providing the formulas of the other two methods of Vc calculation can be beneficial to the readers.

Line 218 – some authors have used inter-electrode distances between 5-10 cm, could you explain why you chose 7cm in particular? What are its benefits over other inter-electrode distances?

Methodology:

Perhaps consider also adding normalised response speed (Vrn), as it provides a value that is much easier to interpret and manageable.

Discussion:

Line 319-320 – this line is a bit confusing, did you mean “an increase in Tc can be expected if Dm increases, even while Vc remains unchanged”?

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes: Angus Hunter

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: review PONE-D-21-24120.docx

Reproducibility of knee extensor and flexor contraction velocity in healthy men and women assessed using tensiomyography: A study protocol

PONE-D-21-24120R1

Dear Dr. Langen,

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,

Emiliano Cè

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does the manuscript provide a valid rationale for the proposed study, with clearly identified and justified research questions?

The research question outlined is expected to address a valid academic problem or topic and contribute to the base of knowledge in the field.

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

2. Is the protocol technically sound and planned in a manner that will lead to a meaningful outcome and allow testing the stated hypotheses?

The manuscript should describe the methods in sufficient detail to prevent undisclosed flexibility in the experimental procedure or analysis pipeline, including sufficient outcome-neutral conditions (e.g. necessary controls, absence of floor or ceiling effects) to test the proposed hypotheses and a statistical power analysis where applicable. As there may be aspects of the methodology and analysis which can only be refined once the work is undertaken, authors should outline potential assumptions and explicitly describe what aspects of the proposed analyses, if any, are exploratory.

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

3. Is the methodology feasible and described in sufficient detail to allow the work to be replicable?

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors described where all data underlying the findings will be made available when the study is complete?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception, at the time of publication. 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

**********

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

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above and, if applicable, provide comments about issues authors must address before this protocol can be accepted for publication. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about research or publication ethics.

You may also provide optional suggestions and comments to authors that they might find helpful in planning their study.

(Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Thanks for the correction. Your work will provide useful information for future readers of the TMG protocol. I look forward to your further research.

**********

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