Longwan 5: A Semi-Leafless Sugar Snap Pea Cultivar Resistant to Powdery Mildew

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Vegetable peas are very popular with the population,  but its breeding in many countries of the world, including China, is somewhat behind the achievements in dry peas. This applies to lodging and the susceptibility to diseases, including powdery mildew – one of the most dangerous.

The paper is devoted to the results of testing a Chinese variety of vegetable pea Longwan 5 with a semi-leaf morphotype, which is still very little used in the breeding  of vegetable peas, but dry pea varieties almost completely have this as basic trait. The paper convincingly shows the advantages of the new variety over the check conventional  varieties: it is less affected by the disease, less lodging,  more productive and matures sooner.

The disadvantages include:

1.       the methodology for determining the degree of resistance to the disease is poorly prescribed.

It is recommended to give it more thoroughly. As the criteria for assessing resistance-susceptibility to diseases vary around the world, it is better to indicate what the points mean: what proportion of resistant-susceptible plants corresponds to the highest/minimal score.

2.       To point the number of evaluated characters – 13?

3.       The structure of the article should be changed, namely, to separate the results and discussion. The results can be given point by point, as they are given in the manuscript, and the discussion can be given in a single block.

4.       The line 290 – in the middle of the sentence remove the capital letter

Author Response

Reviewer 1#

1. the methodology for determining the degree of resistance to the disease is poorly prescribed. It is recommended to give it more thoroughly. As the criteria for assessing resistance-susceptibility to diseases vary around the world, it is better to indicate what the points mean: what proportion of resistant-susceptible plants corresponds to the highest/minimal score.

Response: We quite agree with the advice of modification. We have added this part to the article, see Article lines 166-186.

2. To point the number of evaluated characters – 13?

Response: We have pointed to the number of evaluated characters. see Article lines 188

Evaluated morphological characteristics and agronomic traits including:

• DM = Days to maturity (d);
• PH = Plant height (cm);
• IPMS = Internodes per main stem;
• BPP = Branches per plant;
• NFF = Node to fist flower;
• PL = Pod length (cm);
• DPR = Double pod rate (%);
• PPP = Pods per plant;
• HGPW = Hundred green pod weight (g);
• LS = Lodging score (1-5);
• RPM= Resistance t to powdery mildew;
• GPY = Green pod yields

3. The structure of the article should be changed, namely, to separate the results and discussion. The results can be given point by point, as they are given in the manuscript, and the discussion can be given in a single block.

Response: We have separated the results and discussion in the article. see Article lines 306- 410

4. The line 290 – in the middle of the sentence remove the capital letter

Response: We have removed the capital letter.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

This is a summarizing study about breeding workflow developing new cultivar/variety.

The study describes new pea variety Longwan 5 (X9002) which is high yielding, superior quality, multiple resistance and climate resilient garden pea cultivar developed by hybridization between Shuanghua 101 and Baofeng 3. It is a semi-leafless pea variety with superiority over existing approved varieties Qizhen 76 and Xucai 1 in terms of green pod yield, medium maturity and double podding. The readability of the manuscript is fluent and understandable. There are some concerns which should be addressed:

1.      Additional English editing should be done; please check the use of prepositions (I am not a native English speaker but there might be some corrections needed for the final tuning of the manuscript).

2.      Every breeding program provides a lot of information on selected lines in each filial generation. You described morphological/agronomic, some nutritional quality traits…what about assessing genetic background of the lines in terms of marker assisted selection. Do you have any information about the trait-related genes on this new cultivar? Please explain/discuss and include this point of view which is of a key importance for growing this cultivar under different environments…

Please check the typing mistakes, spaces, style and references according to mdpi journal requirements.

Author Response

Point 1   Additional English editing should be done; please check the use of prepositions (I am not a native English speaker but there might be some corrections needed for the final tuning of the manuscript).

Response 1: We have made careful grammatical changes to the article.

Point 2   Every breeding program provides a lot of information on selected lines in each filial generation. You described morphological/agronomic, some nutritional quality traits…what about assessing genetic background of the lines in terms of marker assisted selection. Do you have any information about the trait-related genes on this new cultivar? Please explain/discuss and include this point of view which is of a key importance for growing this cultivar under different environments…

Response 2: We agree with this constructive proposal completely.

We add some information about the trait-related genes (genes for resistance to powdery mildew) on Longwan 5 and other cultivar in the discussion of the article.

Point 3   Please check the typing mistakes, spaces, style and references according to mdpi journal requirements.

Response 3: We have checked some typing mistakes, spaces, style and references according to mdpi journal requirements.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx