PONE-D-22-00891Photogrammetric reconstruction of 3D carpological collection in high resolution for plants authentication and species discoveryPLOS ONE

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PLOS ONE

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Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

Dear authors,

Both reviews consider the paper to contain good points for publication. However, both of them still have several concerns to be addressed. Please address the comments and requests point by point. In addition, I think the authors should provide additional comparisons with competing techniques by including some quantitative evaluations, even in simple cases (or synthetic) could be enough. Regarding failure cases, I think they need to be deeply shown and discussed in the paper to help the reader. What about the use of photometric stereo approaches? I believe current methods could generate very accurate estimations in this context. Evaluation of accuracy from a theoretical point of view. Why should this method produce better solutions?

Best

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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: N/A

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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: No

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 is a very interesting and potentially very useful contribution for the creation of 3D images of plant fruits and seeds. I believe that those interested in creating a collection of such images would find the information provided here very useful. For those who might be trying to decide whether or not to embark on the creation of such an image library, as part of a virtual herbarium, or some other project, it would be useful to have some additional information -- what is the image file size generated, what is the cost, or amount of time needed to capture a completed image. I think the arguments presented for why one should create such an imaging library could be strengthened -- how are such images used in research today, both within the plant biodiversity community, and by outside users? What are the key characteristics that can be observed through this method that cannot be seen with traditional 2D images? If the creation of a carpological 3D image library should indeed be a key component of a virtual herbarium, as the authors suggest, then there needs to be more of a discussion of how such images improve plant knowledge.

Reviewer #2: This paper provides an accurate and efficient method to reconstruct detailed and high-resolution digital 3D models of carpological materials by photogrammetric method. It gives the method in details on selection of digital camera body, camera lens, adjustment of light source, and software selection. It is very like a guideline of 3D model reconstruction. And the readers can get the related information from other places, such as the guide of the 3D model software. But I think the paper should focus on how to do plants authentication and species discovery using the reconstructed 3D model. Hopefully, the authors can add the above related content.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Barbara M Thiers

Reviewer #2: No

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: Thiers comments_PONE-D-22-00891.pdf

Photogrammetric reconstruction of 3D carpological collection in high resolution for plants authentication and species discovery

PONE-D-22-00891R1

Dear Dr. LAU,

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,

Antonio Agudo

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Dear authors,

Thank you very much for providing a point-by-point review. Both reviewers considered the paper ready for publication.

Best

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: N/A

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

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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 paper has been revised according to my suggestions and I think it can be accepted. This paper gives very detailed guide for 3D model reconstruction and comparison with different methods.

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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: Yes: Barbara Mary Thiers

Reviewer #2: No

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