Peer Review History
| Original SubmissionNovember 9, 2022 |
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PONE-D-22-30988Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and nonbiodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinereaPLOS ONE Dear Dr. DeVetter, 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. ============================== Reviewer’s comments on the manuscript have now been received. Having considered these comments alongside your paper there is need of major revisions. The authors claimed the authors explore the impact of diverse mulches in B. cinerea conidia dispersion by water splashed. The manuscript is written in a concise manner but still need improvements suggested by the reviewers. A few of the suggestion are; The experiments appear to have been done with rigor, using robust replicates, with no uncontrolled variables. It is not clear to me the usage of the absorbent mat in the experiment. At what point is it added? Also not clear at which point the conidia counting was performed. Was it after the 18hours of incubation? How long where the conidia at 1ºC? Discussion should be improved as there is a need to correlate the results of current study with the previous findings. Also draw a putative applicable conclusion based on the regression for strawberry farms in their choices of mulches and/or plant distancing. Furthermore the manuscript needs to be checked for grammatical errors and typo mistakes. English language should be improved by a native English speaker. The detailed reviewer’s suggestions and revisions are attached that should be considered before finalizing the manuscript. ============================== Please submit your revised manuscript by Jan 26 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 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:
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Thank you for stating the following in the Acknowledgments Section of your manuscript: "This project was funded by the Washington State Department of Agriculture. We are thankful to Emma Rogers, Brenda Madrid, Rachel Schick, Dakota McFadden, and Roshani Baral for their help with application of the rain simulator system and data collection. We also would like to thank David DeVetter for input on rain simulator design. " 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. 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If applicable, please specify in the figure caption text when a figure is similar but not identical to the original image and is therefore for illustrative purposes only. Additional Editor Comments: Reviewer’s comments on the manuscript have now been received. Having considered these comments alongside your paper there is need of major revisions. The authors claimed the authors explore the impact of diverse mulches in B. cinerea conidia dispersion by water splashed. The manuscript is written in a concise manner but still need improvements suggested by the reviewers. A few of the suggestion are; The experiments appear to have been done with rigor, using robust replicates, with no uncontrolled variables. It is not clear to me the usage of the absorbent mat in the experiment. At what point is it added? Also not clear at which point the conidia counting was performed. Was it after the 18hours of incubation? How long where the conidia at 1ºC? Discussion should be improved as there is a need to correlate the results of current study with the previous findings. Also draw a putative applicable conclusion based on the regression for strawberry farms in their choices of mulches and/or plant distancing. Furthermore the manuscript needs to be checked for grammatical errors and typo mistakes. English language should be improved by a native English speaker. The detailed reviewer’s suggestions and revisions are attached that should be considered before finalizing the manuscript. [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 Reviewer #2: Partly Reviewer #3: Yes ********** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ********** 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: No Reviewer #3: 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 Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: 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: COMMENTS FOR THE AUTHOR The manuscript ‘Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and non-biodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea’ reports an interesting work providing important data regarding investigation of splash dispersal dynamics of Botrytis cinerea when exposed to various plastic mulch surfaces. In addition, several points need to be improved, as follows: Introduction: 1- The author mentioned that plastic mulches impact splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea conidia, but there isn’t much focus on this statement in introduction with regard to references. Please clarify more. 2- Did the author investigate impact of different plastic mulches with varying surface characteristics with regard to their manufacturing and formulation? They may have different impact on splash dispersal of pathogen spores and disease risk of fungal pathogens such as B. cinerea. This should be clearly elaborated to avoid confusions. Material and Methodology: 1- From where unweathered PE, weedmat, and embossed BDM were taken, which author used in this study? Source should be clearly mentioned. 2- The author mentioned that for each mulch treatment, a large plastic Petri dish (14 cm in diameter) was filled with greenhouse growing medium. Was the experiment conducted in-vitro? Where the petri dish was placed later? What about other parameters including temperature? 3- The author mentioned that for conidial splash dispersal of B. cinerea, experiment was conducted in a fully enclosed screen house. The ground of screenhouse was covered with woven landscape polyethylene fabric. Mention source. 4- To prepare the conidial suspension, the isolate was cultured on full-strength potato dextrose agar. Was pathogenicity of botrytis cinerea also conducted? 5- Statistical analysis: Which ANOVA was used? Please clarify technical replicates. Results: 1- While analysis of investigating impact of plastic mulches on conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea, did the author applied any control in experiment? Clarify. 2- The discussion must be more developed to better value the results obtained and should go beyond the content of paper, highlighting promising evidence for future application. 3- Latin names must be reported in italics. 4- The English form should be carefully revised. Reviewer #2: In the article “Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and nonbiodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea”, the authors explore the impact of diverse mulches in B. cinerea conidia dispersion by water splashed. Through the development of a rain simulator system, conidial splashes are evaluated in terms of horizontal distance, as well as their germination potential. The article is written in an easily comprehensible English and it is pleasant to read. The abstract sums well the findings of the authors, however, the last sentence should not be an element present in the abstract. The introduction is well written, summarizing the current knowledge and gap on research where the paper fits. It exposes the relevant information for both acquainted and new readers on the topic. Some notes: - B. cinerea is currently defined as hemibiotrophic, and therefore the categorisation of necrotrophic as in line 54 should be revised. (Recommended: Veloso J, van Kan JAL. Many Shades of Grey in Botrytis-Host Plant Interactions. Trends Plant Sci. 2018 Jul;23(7):613-622. doi: 10.1016/j.tplants.2018.03.016. Epub 2018 Apr 30. PMID: 29724660.) - Not only ripe fruits are susceptible to B. cinerea as said in line 55, there has been reports of green fruits infected. Consider including the word "post-harvest" too in line 56. (Recommended: Agudelo-Romero P, Erban A, Rego C, Carbonell-Bejerano P, Nascimento T, Sousa L, Martínez-Zapater JM, Kopka J, Fortes AM. Transcriptome and metabolome reprogramming in Vitis vinifera cv. Trincadeira berries upon infection with Botrytis cinerea. J Exp Bot. 2015 Apr;66(7):1769-85. doi: 10.1093/jxb/eru517. Epub 2015 Feb 11. PMID: 25675955; PMCID: PMC4669548.) -Line 74 and 75, the "respectively" is not clear in which pathogen is related to which disease. M&M are very detailed, and in general clear and possible reproduced by others if wanted. The experiments appear to have been done with rigor, using robust replicates, with barely no uncontrolled variables. Some notes/questions: -It is not clear to me the usage of the absorbent mat in the experiment. At what point is it added? Please clarify in text and/or improve figure 3. Also, was the mat used or considered for the uniformity test? If not, why? -It's not clear at which point the conidia counting was performed. Was it after the 18hours of incubation? How long where the conidia at 1ºC? (line 209) -Please provide or include in supplementary a picture to go with S3 Table of the conidia counting and germination with scale of proper germ tube length. (line 211) -data analysis: Please clarify what you mean with "while TibyT, and GibyG data were in percentages, so they were subjected to a normal distribution." Which test did you use to verify normal distribution? line 239. Results are well exposed, though not always presented in the easiest way to read. Discussion is rather descriptive, unfortunately. Please explore and compare the results with the current literature already referenced by the authors in the introduction. Also draw a putative applicable conclusion based on the regression for strawberry farms in their choices of mulches and/or plant distancing. Some notes/questions: - line 260. How much of the volume was lost in infiltration in weedmat, how did that affect the experiment, and how did you solve it? Did the weedmat filtrate the conidia, or were they drained with the water? - line 278 makes this paper redundant and irrelevant if the authors start to introduce already "Ifs” at the beginning of the discussion. Please reconsider its writing. The article is clear on the feedstock ingredients of each mulch used. I think it's irrelevant to highlight so much how different feedstocks can affect the results, when 3 are already being compared. Re-write paragraph starting at 271 to showcase the problematic as a research gap and not as an obstacle. (Example: So far, it has been unclear if the feedstock ingredients....etc) -How do you explain such variation in weedmat in the first distance, compared to the others? -Further explain how permeability may promote/limit conidia dispersion, and the dis/advantage of weedmat over the other two mulches. -Data in Table 3 could gain more by being presented as plot(s). X-axis maybe either by mulch or distance, for example. -Line 362. Please consider referring other fruits more similar to strawberry, such as grapes or tomatoes, instead of just lentils. -The non-replicated splash dynamics study is too extensive for a non-concluding experiment. If not better integrated in the overall article, maybe should be considered for supplementary data instead. Regarding references, most of the cited literature is old (<20 years). More recent and revised literature is available, especially in botrytis. Ref 17 and 18 are the same. Figures notes/questions: FIGURE 1: Despite being an example of B. cinerea, it would be more interesting to have a picture with already visible conidia formation instead of just apparent mycelium, as conidia are the problematic of the article. FIGURE 2: If known, add in the caption the type of plastic mulch used in the picture. FIGURE 3: Centre water drop is not clear that is the conidial suspension. Please correct. Refer in the caption the conidia concentration used too. FIGURE 4: Any reason to use a different method to photograph the weedmat? How does its surface compare to the other two at the same magnification? Axis in figure 4 are unreadable. I also think plots would gain by having the same scale, all aligned at y=0, for an easier comparison between the three mulches. S4 table: what is the purpose of the letter b in the germination rate of PE 28 cm? Small notes: -GCi is defined a second time at 321. It was already done at 214. -TCi is defined a second time at 282. It was already done at 213. -Overall, choose between the term conidia or spore and make it uniform across the manuscript. Overall, the experiments address an interesting problematic of strawberry farms and indeed meet the objectives and sub-objectives defined in the introduction. However, data is not properly explored to its full potential, and discussion lacks hypothesis beyond the descriptive results. In the current state, this article is not up to standards and need improvements. If improvements are achieved, this paper has potential for a quality publication. Reviewer #3: it is a good piece of scientific work performed by the authors. the data was presented in a good and scientific way. However some modifications are needed in the manuscript. Introduction needs to be improved by the addition of more relevant literature and make easy to understand for the non-native english speakers. Materials methods section is good results and discussion section needs more elaboration and comparison with literature. conclusion section needs complete revision and clearly mentioning of results. ********** 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 Reviewer #2: Yes: Helena Santos Reviewer #3: 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". 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| Revision 1 |
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Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and nonbiodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea PONE-D-22-30988R1 Dear Dr. DeVetter, 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, Abhay K. Pandey Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): authors addressed all comments. 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 ********** 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: Author has incorporated all suggestions carefully. Discussion is also improved to some extent. I am much satisfied Reviewer #2: In the improved article “Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and nonbiodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea”, the authors explore the impact of diverse mulches in B. cinerea conidia dispersion by water splashed. The authors addressed all my points and questions, defended their choices very well, and performed adequate modifications to the manuscript such as improvement of the discussion, correction of the figures, and clarification of the methods. I have no further comments to improve the manuscript, and I am rather pleased with the current version. I believe it fits the standards of PLOS ONE for publication and should be accepted. The authors should be proud of their work. ********** 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. Gulshan Irshad Associate Professor Reviewer #2: Yes: Helena Santos ********** |
| Formally Accepted |
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PONE-D-22-30988R1 Physical characteristics of soil-biodegradable and nonbiodegradable plastic mulches impact conidial splash dispersal of Botrytis cinerea Dear Dr. DeVetter: 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. Abhay K. Pandey Academic Editor PLOS ONE |
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