PONE-D-24-46367Water production efficiency and economic benefits under diversified planting modes of intercropping-multiple cropping in arid regionsPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Jing Chen,

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In the introduction, is not sufficient delving into background review to justify importance of the study (more literature required, preferably no older than 5 years. In Methods, although one reviewer commended the general model applied in materials and methods, the other thought that there would better be need to Include a conceptual or diagrammatic framework outlining the experimental protocol. Also the study design needs to be more clearly out-layed and the research objectives/questions presented more clearly to address gaps in research that these questions seek to address. There is also need for a clear (set of) hypotheses, including the authors’ own expectations of what the findings might be (based on that/those hypotheses. For units, the authors need to settle for either metric (such as m) or hectares throughout

In the results, there is need to Include a clear outline of the merits of the range of experimental treatments i.e. show which treatments ranked higher than which

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PLOS ONE

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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: Yes

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: Specific Comments

Abstract

The abstract needs to be revised extensively. Please find comments in attached pdf file.

Introduction

The introduction is not providing enough information on the research background and research gap. The authors are advised to add more relevant literature to introduce the knowledge gap.

Materials and Methods

The authors are advised to add clear graphics to show configurations used in the experiment as the textual content is unclear for reader.

Results

I strongly recommend the authors to write results with exact significant values and then calculate percentage differences between best and worst treatments. And please recheck the results as author wrote PLER in the result and discussion section while in the associated table it is written PLEW. Please review the whole paper for consistency of terminologies and unites.

Discussion

2. I think authors should rethink what they write in the first paragraph and only summarize the main findings in view of the research questions. After this, authors can explore different aspects of the work in subsequent paragraphs and explain how their findings expand the envelope of knowledge, but first of all, authors simply need to state the main results without discussing their why and how or the relationships to the literature. First of all, the reader needs a clear statement on what the study found. Moreover, it is suggested to discuss the main results in a logical way.

Authors Read following paper on soil water balance and may include in citation.

Yi, J., Li, H., Zhao, Y., Shao, M., Zhang, H.,... Liu, M. (2022). Assessing soil water balance to optimize irrigation schedules of flood-irrigated maize fields with different cultivation histories in the arid region. Agricultural Water Management, 265, 107543. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agwat.2022.107543

Reviewer #2: 1. Line 24: 16.81 RMB/m3. In fact, I would advise the author to convert to net benifit per hectare.

2. Line 28: m2? In the previous paragraph it is m3

3. Line 53: (LI et al., 2021). Misquoted edit

4. The Introduction section lacks references to the latest relevant research, e.g. Wang et al., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2024.107898

5. Line 75: In wheat-maize intercropping system. You can refences the following research:

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2023.107247

6. Lines 79-80: A vague question. I recommend that authors clarify their research objectives, and to come up with a reasonable presupposition.

7. Line 87: This model can be used in many irrigation districts around the world, not just in experimental area.

8. M&M: Very comprehensive content. The test was done very beautifully.

9. Line 135-156: These formulas need to be supplied with a citation.

10. Line 161: Intercropping

11. Please replace all statistical units with the unit hectare (ha) instead of 667 m2, as this is not internationally common.

12. Table 2: Add line spacing or spaces so that each treatment is clearly distinguishable to the reader

13. Line 212: Interspecies

14. 14. In fact, heat is the key determinant of polyculture. The authors were able to grow multiple crops in a single growing season because sufficient heat was available. Moreover, some crops are heat-loving crops and some are cool-loving. These differences in growth habits between crops lead to complementary ecological niches, which in turn determine yields. Please add relevant discussions：

Chai et al., 2021, PNAS

15. Duplicates appear in the references list, e.g. Wang 2022

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: PONE-D-24-46367.pdf

Attachment

Submitted filename: PONE-D-24-46367_Specific comemnts Additional.pdf

Water production efficiency and economic benefits under diversified planting modes of intercropping-multiple cropping in arid regions

PONE-D-24-46367R1

Dear Dr. Zhang,

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,

Nickson E. Otieno

Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

• In addition to line numbering, all pages must be numbered sequentially
• Replace ‘interspecies’ with ‘interspecific’ throughout the text
• Must leave a line space(skip a line)  between end of one section and title heeding or subheading  of the next section throughout the article.
• Also leave spaces between tables and paragraphs of between paragraphs and figures
• Provide a lot more details in table captions and figure legends to include tests from which they are generated, and indicate standard errors or standard deviations and sample/population sizes (n or N) of the data they come from. Currently you have only a few words  un table captions and figure legends. This is not acceptable
• in Table 1, 2 and 3, the text in the whole column titled ‘Crop’ should be left-justified (do not center the text)
• as was pointed oout at revision 1 and again at revision 2 in review comments, remove all duplicate references listed, and ensure all text-cited references are listed and all listed references are text-cited

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 #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 #2: Yes

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

Reviewer #2: Yes

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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 #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 #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. 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 #2: The author has responded well to my concerns. I think the current version can be published directly.

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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 #2: No

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