Peer Review History

Original SubmissionAugust 29, 2022
Decision Letter - Yung-Fu Chang, Editor

PONE-D-22-24057Immunoinformatics Analysis of Candidate Proteins for Controlling Bovine ParatuberculosisPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Derakhshandeh,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’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. Your manuscript has been reviewed  and a minor revision is needed.  

Please submit your revised manuscript by 2 weeks . If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ 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 academic 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'.
If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Yung-Fu Chang

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements.

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at 

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and 

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=ba62/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_title_authors_affiliations.pdf

2. Thank you for stating the following financial disclosure: 

"This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

Please state what role the funders took in the study.  If the funders had no role, please state: "The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript." 

If this statement is not correct you must amend it as needed. 

Please include this amended Role of Funder statement in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

3. Thank you for stating the following in the Acknowledgments Section of your manuscript: 

"This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

We note that you have provided funding information that is not currently declared in your Funding Statement. However, funding information should not appear in the Acknowledgments section or other areas of your manuscript. We will only publish funding information present in the Funding Statement section of the online submission form. 

Please remove any funding-related text from the manuscript and let us know how you would like to update your Funding Statement. Currently, your Funding Statement reads as follows: 

"This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

Please include your amended statements within your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

4. 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.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

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

**********

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

Reviewer #1: N/A

**********

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

**********

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

**********

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: The study performed on the available data on NCBI and other database. The authors have performed all required analysis for the prediction of protective vaccine against MAP infection. Thay have considered all parameters to be present in a protective antigen candidate. The current manuscript does not have any statistical analysis. All data are available without any restriction and language of authors are technically sound and easy to understand.

**********

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.

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

**********

[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.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: Manuscript Comments.docx
Revision 1

Editor in Chief,

PLOS ONE,

Dear Sir/Madam

We really appreciate reviewer comments which helped us to revise and improve the manuscript. Most comments seemed to be fair and reasonable, so we revise the manuscript according to their advice and suggestions. We believe that the contents and the clarity of our paper are improved in the re-submitted version. Below are point-by-point responses to the reviewers and the journal requirements comments. The revised manuscript was submitted as ‘Highlighted Revised Manuscript’ file which all the requested corrections was addressed in highlighted in yellow. The second file as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript' was also uploaded. I hope the responses satisfy you and the editorial groups in order to publish our paper.

Sincerely Yours,

Abdollah Derakhshandeh

Department of Pathobiology, School of Veterinary Medicine, Shiraz University, Shiraz, 71345-1731, Iran. Tel: +98-7136138666, Mobile: +98-9171825358, Fax: +98-7132286940, Email: drkhshnd77@gmail.com.

Journal Requirements:

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming.

� Response: Yes, All style requirements was done.

2. Thank you for stating the following financial disclosure:

"This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

Please state what role the funders took in the study. If the funders had no role, please state: "The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript." If this statement is not correct you must amend it as needed. Please include this amended Role of Funder statement in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

� Response: The sentence was added in funding statement and highlighted in yellow

3. Thank you for stating the following in the Acknowledgments Section of your manuscript:

"This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

We note that you have provided funding information that is not currently declared in your Funding Statement. However, funding information should not appear in the Acknowledgments section or other areas of your manuscript. We will only publish funding information present in the Funding Statement section of the online submission form.

Please remove any funding-related text from the manuscript and let us know how you would like to update your Funding Statement. Currently, your Funding Statement reads as follows: "This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138). "

Please include your amended statements within your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

� Response: Please include the statement "This work was financially supported partially by a grant from Shiraz University (98GCU2M163973) and also Iran National Science Foundation (INSF) (No. 98023138)." in you online submission on behalf of us. We deleted funding information in the Acknowledgments section or other areas of our manuscript.

4. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct

� Response: All references are complete and correct.

Reviewer Comments:

I have reviewed the manuscript entitled "Immunoinformatics Analysis of Candidate Proteins for Controlling Bovine Paratuberculosis" by Moezzi et. al., The authors have evaluated the efficacy of two proteins MAP2191 and FAP-P to be a potent vaccine candidate against MAP infection using immunoinformatics approaches.

� Response: Thanks for kind words and sentences about our study.

1. The authors have selected only one proteins MAP2191 out of cluster of 6 genes, why only one?, it has been mentioned that all these proteins are involved MAP invasion, survival and virulence (Hemati Z, 2018; Semret M, 2005).

� Response:

Thank you for the comment. Because of identifying and submitting the nucleotide sequence of the MAP2191 gene and some experimental works have been performed on the MAP2191 protein in our lab. So, in this study, the authors have decided to consider the MAP2191 amino acid sequence for immunoinformatics evaluations. Finally, when any researchers work on MAP, she/he must consider the cross reactivity with Mycobacterium bovis. MAP 2191shows no cross reactivity with TB.

2. The author did not mention anywhere whether these protein will act as protective antigen against all serovars or single serovars of MAP.

� Response:

Thanks for raised comments. As stated at the beginning of the results, conserved regions of these two proteins from 12 and 20 amino acid sequences of MAP2191 and FAP-P were selected, respectively. Due to the consideration of conserved regions of different sequences available in the GenBank, the authors believe these two proteins can act as protective antigens against different serovars of MAP.

3. The author should also explore the Virulence database.

� Response:

Many thanks for your suggestion. Regarding the comment of the respected reviewer, the authors have searched the virulence database (VFDB) as the reference database. Two genomes are available for MAP in this database (k10 and MAP4), and their sequences have been released in NCBI. So, the amino acid sequences of MAP2191 and FAP-P that are available in NCBI have been considered in this study.

4. The author can explore the confident B-Cell epitope by using two or more different tool and common prediction by all these will be considered confident B-cell epitope (conformational as well as linear epitope).

� Response:

Many thanks for your good comment. To comply with the reviewer's comment, two servers were considered for linear and conformational epitope prediction in the revised version of the manuscript. The results are given in Table 4 and Table 6, respectively.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: Response to reviewer.docx
Decision Letter - Yung-Fu Chang, Editor

Immunoinformatics Analysis of Candidate Proteins for Controlling Bovine Paratuberculosis

PONE-D-22-24057R1

Dear Dr. Derakhshandeh,

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.

An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org.

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 onepress@plos.org.

Kind regards,

Yung-Fu Chang

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: (No Response)

**********

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: N/A

**********

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: All the 4 comments raised by me in earlier version of paper gas been properly addressed by the authors. They also performed the required analysis for predicting the Confident B-cell epitopes.

Reviewer #2: The authors have provided a detailed study to test the in vitro efficacy of vaccine candidates. The authors have provided sufficient data to support the informatics analysis. In addition, authors have addressed all the reviewers comments.

**********

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: Dr Mohd Abdullah

Reviewer #2: No

**********

Formally Accepted
Acceptance Letter - Yung-Fu Chang, Editor

PONE-D-22-24057R1

Immunoinformatics Analysis of Candidate Proteins for Controlling Bovine Paratuberculosis

Dear Dr. Derakhshandeh:

I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org.

If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org.

Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access.

Kind regards,

PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff

on behalf of

Dr. Yung-Fu Chang

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Open letter on the publication of peer review reports

PLOS recognizes the benefits of transparency in the peer review process. Therefore, we enable the publication of all of the content of peer review and author responses alongside final, published articles. Reviewers remain anonymous, unless they choose to reveal their names.

We encourage other journals to join us in this initiative. We hope that our action inspires the community, including researchers, research funders, and research institutions, to recognize the benefits of published peer review reports for all parts of the research system.

Learn more at ASAPbio .