Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript is very interesting and presents important findings on modeling of the complex dielectric constant of bound water with application in soil microwave remote sensing. The methodology seems sound and the results are presented and discussed in detail. My only general comments are:

First that when I was start reading the introduction of the double-layer model it wasn’t clear if you were talking about the proposed model or an existing model. I believe that this should be made clearer from the beginning of the presentation of the model in order to be easier to separate previous work with the proposed model.

Second, the importance and the implications of this work on remote sensing isn’t discussed at all. What is the merit of the proposed model for microwave remote sensing? What are the expected benefits? This is really important in order to justify the relevance of this paper with remote sensing journal.

I have only some other minor comments included in the pdf file. Please also try to improve a little the figures if possible. The fonts are very small I believe.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Questions (1): “frequency does not regard soil”

Response:

Thanks for your comments. We corrected this mistake.

The original sentence (Line 17-19):

Based on this classification, models for the complex dielectric constants of bound water and soil are established taking into consideration factors such as temperature, moisture, texture, and microwave frequency of soil.

The revised sentence (Line 17-19):

Based on this classification, models for the complex dielectric constants of bound water and soil are established taking into consideration factors such as temperature, moisture, texture, and microwave frequency.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors,

 

I received your manuscript about Analysis and Modeling of the Complex Dielectric Constant of Bound Water with Application in Soil Microwave Remote Sensing for publication in Remote Sensing.

 

I would like to forward my suggestions and hints.

 

All Figures: Please improve the figure quality. I printed you manuscript for review and the figures output was poor.

Number and units: There is a space between number and unit, e. g. 10 kg not 10kg Please improve your manuscript according https://www.bipm.org/utils/common/pdf/si-brochure/SI-Brochure-9.pdf. Please also prove that every number to the power of basis is in superscript Position, e. g. 10^-23 J/K in line 133.

 

Line 130: No, it is exactly 1.602176634 × 10^-19 C, and Avogadro constant please refer to https://www.bipm.org/utils/common/pdf/si-brochure/SI-Brochure-9.pdf if you would not write the full resolution.

The Avogadro constant has a unit, pleas add the unit mol^-1

Line 131: Molar mass water: According to VDI/VDE 3514-1 Measurement of gas humidity – Characteristics and symbols, https://www.vdi.de/richtlinien/details/vdivde-3514-blatt-1-gasfeuchtemessung-kenngroessen-und-formelzeichen it is M = 0,01801528 kg/mol

 

Line 306: How have you determined the moisture (W), temperature (T), specific surface area (AS), specific density (ρS), and bulk density (ρb) of soil are measured? Please explain your measurement setup briefly.

 

Chapter 5:

You show the comparison between soil mixing complex dielectric model and measured data for real and imaginary part.

black vertical line online in the first graphic line. Please add these lines to every graph.

You describe and the relation in a good way and you also discuss influences and express the ARMSE-value. Have you also considered more influence quantities – e. g. how stable is the applied frequency or temperature or moisture content?

Figure 8) There are to many comparisons on one site. Please focus this expression on the most relevant comparisons. This figure appears very overloaded. Maybe it is better if you show the average plus error bars in these figures. The amount of lines will be reduced, and the figures may not be overloaded.

 

Best regards

Author Response

Question 1: “All Figures: Please improve the figure quality. I printed you manuscript for review and the figures output was poor.”

Response:

Thanks for your comments. We accepted this suggestion and improved resolution of figure 3 6 8 from 300DPI to 600 DPI.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf