Review Reports - Diverse Planting Density-Driven Nutrient and Yield Enhancement of Sweet Corn by Zinc and Selenium Foliar Application

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

All the comments have been given in the body of the text of the manuscript

Some casual mistakes can be avoided, the standard units may be given for the data. The references need massive improvement, please follow the MDPI guidelines.

Also in the text, the work of other researchers has not been properly cited, eg. the name of the authors must be given while quoting others' work.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you so much for taking your time to correct my manuscript, that means you have given me the opportunity to improve it more batter. I highly appreciate for taking your time over it. Thank you.

Directly jumping on conclusion without background information, is not very appropriate, food insecurity and Zn and Se application , this much direct relationship needs proper reasoning

Response; Thank you, I have now corrected how you recommended, as seen in the manuscript, from line 11to line 13

51 nutrients are essential for human beings, please recheck this fact, it seems exaggeration.

Response: Thank you, I have rechecked as you suggested. Some Previous studies reported on it such as (Golden, 1991; Branca and Ferrari, 2002; Barrett, 2010; Niyigaba et al., 2019), as seen in manuscript line 36 to 38.

Not adequtely explained the reasons for conducting the study on planting density and micro nutrient usage by the crops or its impact on biofortification of grains. Please explain scientifically, why these studies were done in combination.

Response: Thank you, In the manuscript, from line 103 to line 110, I have corrected and clarified more as per recommendation and made it more understandable.

How copulation was maintained, specify the crop geometry under each treatment

Response: Thank you, I have corrected the manuscript from line 165 to 173 to fit accordingly on copulation and geometry.

There is no effect of the treatments on LAI, how it was possible

Response: Thank you, I have made a correction on the leaf area index as seen from line 384 to line 387

Use standard unit, better these parameters are given in %

Response; Thank you, I have corrected them as to how you recommend, as seen from line 331 to line 335

Unit of value of 15.65?

Response: Thank you, I have corrected and put the unit value as recommended seen in manuscript line 390

The protein content remains signification

Response: Thank you; I have corrected it as seen in the manuscript line 388. Also from line 370 to line 376 I had corrected the sentese to make them more clear.

Reviewer 2 Report

In this manuscript, Shio et al. described some effects on yields of sweat corn under different foliar applications of zinc and selenium. The authors tested the relationship between planting density and grain yield. Moreover, some nutritional values were improved. While I appreciate the effort of the work presented, I think the authors needs to improve the focus of the manuscript and provide more information.

English of the manuscript has to be checked by either native English speaker or a professional editor.

It is reported that application of zinc and selenium has positive effects for grain yield. Further, the association of planting density and grain yield has been reported also. I think a great deal of the description covered in the submitted manuscript has been addressed in prior publications.

Minor comments

Fig. 2. What does the (a) mean?

Fig. 3. What does the (b) mean?

Line 298-299. It seems difficult to understand the meaning. This must be modified.

Table 4. should be the raw data of Fig. 4. I think Fig. 4 seems enough for the manuscript.

Author Response

Thank you so much for taking your time to correct my manuscript, that means you have given me the opportunity to improve it more batter. I highly appreciate for taking your time over it. Thank you.

English of the manuscript has to be checked by either native English speaker or a professional editor.

Response: Thank you, I have worked on the manuscript make correction added more information as suggested and improve English used as seen in the manuscript.

Fig. 2. What does the (a) mean?

Response; Deferent letter on the graph means there is statistical difference while same letter means there is no statistical difference on grain yield.

What does the (b) mean?

Response; Thank you Deferent letter on the graph means there is statistical difference while same letter means there is no statistical difference on different yield parameters.

Line 298-299. It seems difficult to understand the meaning. This must be modified.

Response; Thank you, I have corrected it as seen in line 333 to line 335

Table 4. should be the raw data of Fig. 4. I think Fig. 4 seems enough for the manuscript.

Response: Thank you, from the manuscript table 4 show detailed within all treatment while figure 4 shows the treatment which were affected by combination of planting density zinc and selenium application.

Reviewer 3 Report

Manuscript about sweet corn yield and how it was affected. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of fertilization with Zn and Se on yield and quality of sweet corn varieties under different planting densities. The author clearly distinguishes what had an effect, and what did not have a significant effect, but it is still unclear what those effects are: positive, negative. The methodology is described in detail, but you would very much like a graphical representation to make it easier to capture the information about the treatments, what and how many of them are available. The discussion is well written, a lot of new literature has been used, considering the latest research. Still, the major revision would have to be made before publishing.

Some specific comments:

Line 28 must be "." after [1]. Same in line 29.

Dots, commas, capital letters, and other punctuation must be checked.

Line 36 references 6 and 7, why they are in separate brackets?

First, you write corn, later sweet corn, it do you mean a different plant?

Line 110 what do you mean “site overview”?

Line 128 correct the formula

Section 2.2. Maybe you can graphically plot an experiment?

Section 2.3. It would be useful to indicate the BBCH in which samples were taken.

Line 173. Write like a formula in a new line

The description of the results needs to be arranged in English, it is difficult to understand, the graphs need to choose less "strong" colors.

Different letters in figures shows differences in columns or in all graphs?

Line 315 Please write an author the [40], the same in lien 321…need to check all text. Do like: “Potarzyski and Grzebisz [40]…”

Conclusions should indicate how specifically affected, increased, decreased, had no effect, and so on.

Author Response

Thank you so much for taking your time to correct my manuscript, that means you have given me the opportunity to improve it more batter. I highly appreciate for taking your time over it. Thank you.

Line 28 must be "." after [1]. Same in line 29.

Response ; Thank you, I have corrected all the suggested as seen from line 30 to line 31

Dots, commas, capital letters, and other punctuation must be checked.

Response; Thank you, I have checked them and corrected as seen in the manuscript.

Line 36 references 6 and 7, why they are in separate brackets?

Response; Thank you, I have now put them in bracket as seen in line 38 in the manuscript.

First, you write corn, later sweet corn, it do you mean a different plant?

Response; Thank you for correcting me, they are not different plant, but on first line of the introduction I was referring to corn in general and later I focused of sweet corn variety.

Line 110 what do you mean “site overview”?

Response; Thank you, here I was intending to give briefing of the area, but I have corrected it as seen in the manuscript line 123

Line 128 correct the formula

Response ;Thank you I have corrected the formula as NaHCO_3,as seen in line 141

Section 2.2. Maybe you can graphically plot an experiment?

Response ; Thank you, I have now plot the graphical layout of the experiment as seen in the manuscript line 187 to 191

Section 2.3. It would be useful to indicate the BBCH in which samples were taken.

Response ; Thank you for the suggestion, I have corrected it as seen in line 201

Line 173. Write like a formula in a new line

Response ; Thank you, I have corrected it as seen in the manuscript line 198.

The description of the results needs to be arranged in English, it is difficult to understand, the graphs need to choose less "strong" colors.

Response ; Thank you, I have corrected all the description as suggested.

Different letters in figures shows differences in columns or in all graphs?

Response ; Thank you, from the manuscript different letters shows differences in all graphs

Line 315 Please write an author the [40], the same in lien 321…need to check all text. Do like: “Potarzyski and Grzebisz [40]…”

Response ; Thank you, I have corrected the whole manuscript as suggested on referencing.

Conclusions should indicate how specifically affected, increased, decreased, had no effect, and so on.

Response ; Thank you, I have corrected and show the specificity on conclusion as seen in the line 437 to line 447

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The revised version of manuscript does not seem to have improved the points that I have suggested.

First, my main concerning is novelty of submitted research. It has been reported that application of zinc and selenium has positive effects for grain yield. Further, the association of planting density and grain yield has been reported also. I think a great deal of the description covered in the submitted manuscript has been addressed in prior publications. The authors should describe what is the novelty or uniqueness in this research.

Minor comments

What does the (a) mean in Line 294 (Fig. 3), and the (b) in Line 308 (Fig. 4)?

Author Response

Thank you so much for taking your time to correct my manuscript, that means you have given me the opportunity to improve the manuscript even better. I highly appreciate for taking your time over it. Thank you.

Response: Thank you, It has been reported zinc and selenium affect the grain yield, and other studies highlighted the effect of planting density on grain yield, but few studies combine the foliar application of zinc and selenium, planting density and variety on yield and quality.

In previous studies, there was much concern about increasing yield, but for our research, we want to increase both yield and quality. Our findings show that there was a significant effect of foliar application planting density on zinc grain content, as shown in Figure 5. This shows foliar zinc application in density 1 performed well.

Also, from line 46 to line 56 we have described why we don’t only need to increase yield but also grain quality.

What does the (a) mean in Line 294 (Fig. 3),

Response; Deferent letter in each season on the graph means a statistical difference while the same letter means no statistical difference in yield parameters.

The (b) in Line 308 (Fig. 4)?

Response; Thank you. Deferent letters in each season on the graph mean a statistical difference while the same letter means no statistical difference in yield parameters.

Reviewer 3 Report

Now it's looks much better.

Author Response

Thank you so much for taking your time to correct my manuscript and seconding it. I appreciate.