PONE-D-24-12227Phytochemicals-Linked Dual Functional Food Safety and Human Health Protective Benefits of Select Food-Based BotanicalsPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Shetty,

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.

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In this manuscript, authors have studied about quantification of soluble phenolic content and phenolic profile in hot water extracts of amla (Phyllanthus emblica), clove (Syzygium aromaticum), kokum (Garcinia indica), and garlic (Allium sativum) using in vitro assay models as well as antimicrobial activity against strains of Salmonella Enteritidis, Listeria monocytogenes, and Escherichia coli. Authors have also studied about antioxidant, anti-hyperglycemic and anti hypertensive activity of the extracts was also determined using in vitro assay models and have reported that extracts have phenolic phytochemicals such as gallic, cinnamic, ellagic, benzoic, dihydroxybenzoic, protocatechuic, and p-coumaric acid along with catechin, rutin; significant antimicrobial activity against most of the bacterial strains; significant antioxidant,  anti-hyperglycemic and antihypertensive activity among the botanical extracts.

It is a good piece of research work however; the submitted manuscript in its current form is not acceptable for publication in the esteemed “Plos One” journal and requires minor revision. It is requested that authors must modify the manuscript according to reviewer’s comments. The corrections made in the manuscript should be highlighted. So, it would be easier to identify the modified content from the original submitted manuscript.

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Pankaj Singh, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Additional Editor Comments:

Editor’ Comments:

1.  Authors can add the name of chemicals used in the study in Chemicals used section.

2.  Authors have reported the values like rutin (2.24 μg/g FW or DW)……………, Authors must clearly mention in whole manuscript weather reported values are from fresh weight or dry weight sample.

3. In Table 2, the unit of MIC is missing.

4. Caption should be very clear regarding use of symbol. Authors must clearly explain the symbol used in the Figure and Table.

5. The significance levels in the Tables are not very much clear.

6. Please improve the image quality of Figure 2.

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

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: 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: Phytochemicals-Linked Dual Functional Food Safety and Human Health Protective

Benefits of Select Food-Based Botanicals

The following are my observations and recommendations for the improvement of the manuscript:

1) The Title of the manuscript needs a recast

2) Page 3, lines 46 - 51 of the introduction was a repetition of what was written in the abstract.

3) Page 3, line 51. NCDs can be listed

4) In the introduction section, a definition of phytochemicals-rich food-based botanicals can be provided for better understanding.

5) Page 3, line 62. Remove "another phytochemicals rich botanical"; Line 68: The word typhimurium is a serotype so must start with caps and not in italics. This should be corrected throughout the entire manuscript.

6) Page 4, line 81. Information about garlic should start in a new paragraph.

7) Heading 2.4: There was too much repetition of "used in this study" when highlighting the various bacterial strains

8) Replace "select" with "selected" in the whole manuscript.

9) line 290: This should be below Figure 1

10) line 308-309: I will suggest that this should start on a new paragraph for better clarity and organization of the manuscript

11) line 317-321: This is a repetition of information provided in Table 1. Discuss the results obtained in the Table with some existing literature and not repeat what is on the Table.

Page 31: line 290 to 296: The text should be pasted below Figure 2.

12) Page 21: Where this appeared: Instead, the garlic extracts enhanced the growth of these serovars when compared to the control (data not shown). I suggest that data on the garlic extract enhancing the growth of the Salmonella serovars should be briefly discussed to know how high the growth was during the incubation period. The mechanism behind this can also be checked and understood.

Overall, these are my recommendations for improvement of this manuscript:

1. The originality and significance of the article should be justified in line with existing literature to strengthen the arguments in the manuscript.

2. The clarity, organization, and coherence of the article should be improved

3. The writing style and structure of the article should be improved to allow the logical flow of ideas presented in the manuscript as suggested in (2) above.

Other concerns are marked out in the pdf format of the manuscript.

Reviewer #2: Dear Authors,

The research is scientifically relevant, however, small adjustments are necessary.

Considerations follow:

In the Materials and methods topic, it is essential to inform the concentration range of gallic acid used in the standard curve.

Reviewer #3: The manuscript is well-written and well-designed. The flow of the manuscript was very good. The abstract was very informative and brief. the introduction covered the required literatures related to the studied plants. The materials and methods are described in details. the data was well-presented and discussed very well- the conclusion is supporting the objective of the study. The tables and the figures are clear and presented the data very well. only very minor corrections in the attached manuscript need to be addressed.

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Kolawole Banwo

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

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Attachments

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Submitted filename: PONE-D-24-12227_reviewer_KB 210424.pdf

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Submitted filename: Manuscript Text PLOS ONE.docx

Phytochemical-Linked Food Safety and Human Health Protective Benefits of the Selected Food-Based Botanicals

PONE-D-24-12227R1

Dear Dr. Shetty,

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Kind regards,

Pankaj Singh, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments: