Applying Spatial Statistical Analysis to Ordinal Data for Soybean Iron Deficiency Chlorosis

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript studies 8 different models that account spatial variation of ordinal data using Iron Deficiency Chlorosis (IDC) phenotype scores. The topic of the current research is within the scope of “Agronomy”. The manuscript however needs some major recommendations.

Ref:
Title: Geospatial Statistic analyses ordinal data for Soybean Iron Deficiency Chlorosis

Manuscript number: Agronomy -1872019

 

Reviewer comments:

 

Major comments:

 

The manuscript studies 8 different models that account spatial variation of ordinal data using Iron Deficiency Chlorosis (IDC) phenotype scores. The topic of the current research is within the scope of “Agronomy”. The manuscript however needs some major recommendations.

 

The introduction is well written and readable. The material and method section however contains a lot of terms and abbreviations are not fully distinct in their understanding. An abbreviation table need to be added in order to define sufficiently the meanings of the used factors. Additionally, the data section should be revised in order to make clearer to the reader which of the dataset group was used in the models analysis. Attention should be paid in the terms used in Results that are not sufficiently analysed in Material and Method section.

 

 

·       L60, L214, L211. The terms like range, row, testing lines, sighted throughout the manuscript are not fully distinct in their understanding.

·       L69-73. How the scale IDC score from 1 to 5 or to 9 is performed? It is used a colour refers or a specific sensor? Please define.

·       L84. To my comprehension, the visual-based pheno-type selection and marker-assisted selection are factors used in the process of the historical data collection. In my opinion, therefore, the author should analyze in greater detail the aforementioned factors to be more clear the method of which the historical data were collected.

·       L89-94. Use smaller sentences to avoid misunderstandings.

·       L105.  Replace “these models” with “these geospatial models”.

·       L192-193. What is the difference between the severity of the spatial variation and the irregularity of variation pattern? Define

·       L201. Is not clear the method followed for the historical data collection.

·       L210-215. Is not clear the method in which the simulation data were generated. Please define.

·       L223-225. Table 1 should be merged.

·       In view of the fact that there is a large number of terms and abbreviations, an abbreviation table should be added.

·       L230-232. The correlation between the IDC score and the actually IDC level was performed visually or using sensor. If it was performed visually the operator error it was adjusted to the methodology?

·       L236-252. It is confused the methodology of which the 5 datasets, 3 classes and 3 IDC spatial patterns are connected. This part should be revised in order to be more readable and understanding.

·       L302. In my opinion, layout examples from the rest model are required for better understanding of models setup.

·       L481, 504, 518. Is confused what are the three datasets analyzed in Results section since five dataset are presented in Table 1. Please define sufficiently in materials and method section.

·       Additionally, why only the  P-spline model SpATS analysis is performed in Results section? What about the SAR and the mvngGRAd models that were analysed in the current research?

·       L536, 565. There is no reference in materials and methods section about the methodology followed to calculate spatial effective dimension. Please revise accordingly.

Author Response

Dear reviewers,

We appreciate the reviewers and the editor for your valuable comments/suggestions, and we have taken your suggestions seriously and made revisions carefully to the manuscript according to your recommendations. Below are the point-by-point responses (attached file); hopefully, the revisions meet what you suggested. 

 

Thank you and best regards,

 

Zhanyou Xu

On behalf of all authors

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

"Geospatial Statistic analyses ordinal data for Soybean Iron Deficiency Chlorosis" - I suggest rephrasing the article title. 

  "Several spatial models have been developed to account for spatial variation, showing that spatial models can successfully increase the quality of phenotype measurement and subsequent selection accuracy for continuous data types such as grain yield and plant height." - Better to fragment and simplify the sentence.  " For stress traits in which the phenotypic data is recorded in ordinal data scores, such as in iron deficiency chlorosis (IDC), the spatial adjustment has not been well studied"  - Not clear   "IDC symptoms in Iowa and southern Minnesota often ap- 74 pear to consist of oval-shaped patches" - This is very interesting to know. If the shape is mostly oval then there may be a center point where this IDC triggering agent is present. May be a specific decomposing rock or anything else otherwise the shave should be irregular. Agronomic practices like soil preparation with tractors over several years will surely make soil patches uniformly merged. this is just a thought.     " The above three groups of spatial models to adjust field variation have been mainly  applied in econometrics and geostatistics and a few for plant breeding for continuous  data, such as crop grain yield and plant height" - here not clear what the authors mean by econometrics.    Are these methods helpful for the evaluation of other traits like yield components? Even though such traits do not have visible patches but if IDC can have such patches at mild IDC or due to other soil heterogeneity there may be a patchy effect of other experiments as well.     " the study.RRV" - typo Table 1 - need to use the abbreviation RRV uniformly for  Red River Valley.  Why Table 1 is splitted.    

Author Response

Dear reviewers,

We appreciate the reviewers and the editor for your valuable comments/suggestions, and we have taken your suggestions seriously and made revisions carefully to the manuscript according to your recommendations. Below are the point-by-point responses(attached file); hopefully, the revisions and responses meet what you suggested. 

 

Thank you and best regards,

 

Zhanyou Xu

On behalf of all authors

Author Response File: Author Response.docx