PONE-D-24-24904Analysis of surface bacterial diversity after wheat infection with powdery mildew and evaluation of its potential function in biological controlPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Xue,

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Please address all the questions raised by both reviewers and revise the manuscript.

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Academic Editor

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: No

Reviewer #2: Partly

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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: No

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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: Xue et al analyzed surface bacterial diversity after wheat infection with powdery mildew and tried to evaluate the potential function of bacteria in biological control. The manuscript is not well-organized and only presents the descriptive results.

1. Since powdery mildew can not infect roots of wheat, it is not easy to understand why authors identify the bacteria changes in the roots.

2. Since authors did not evaluate the biocontrol function of the bacteria, it is not suitable mention the information in the title.

3. Authors only showed the differences in the bacterial changes. It is good for readers to know which bacteria are capable of efficiently functioning in biocontrol.

4. The introduction and discussion parts should be significantly improved.

Reviewer #2: Firstly, I appreciate all the authors of this paper for their research plan and work done.

The title of the parer is "Analysis of surface bacterial diversity after wheat infection with powdery mildew and

evaluation of its potential function in biological control." After reading the entire paper I have observed the authors have statistically analyzed surface bacterial diversity in wheat after powdery mildew infection but evaluation of its potential function in biological control is not clear. The authors have mentioned in Materials and methods under 2.6 Sequence optimization and bacterial function prediction (line no 149), as 'The functional prediction of bacteria refers to these websites: (line no165)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov; https://microbewiki.kenyon.edu; https://bacdive.dsmz (line no 165). de/strain (line no 167). And in Results, the details of functional prediction of bacteria are not found. So, clearly show the results of functional prediction of bacteria and explain about it. Shed light on the different evaluation parameters used for functional prediction of bacteria.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Analysis of structural and metabolic changes in surface microorganisms following powdery mildew infection in wheat and assessment of their potential function in biological control

PONE-D-24-24904R1

Dear Dr. Xue,

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,

Kandasamy Ulaganathan

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 #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: Authors have modified the discussion and have adequately addressed my comments raised in a previous round of review. I have no more comments for the authors.

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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 #2: Yes:  Latha Battu

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