Physical Factors Impacting the Survival and Occurrence of Escherichia coli in Secondary Habitats
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript reads well and logically laid out.
Major concerns,
- The manuscript is rather narrow in scope.
- There is an implicit assumption that E. coli are equivalent with respect to their human health risk and that all hosts shed similar E. coli strains. There is significant body of literature showing that E. coli belong to different phylogenetic groups and specific strains differ significantly in their specific metabolic/physiological characteristics and risk profiles.
- There is no mention of routes of infection such as recreation, consuming improperly treated water, raw vegetables. There is no mention of water treatment methods such as UV light, filtration, sedimentation or artificial wetlands. There is no mention of biofilms and only passing mention of E. coli predation (by protozoa and phage).
- The section from Line 130 to 152 heavily relies on one paper published 14 years ago (Reference 13).
Similarly the section on "Solar Insolation" from Line 154 to 174 relies almost entirely on one reference (25). There is no mention of UV light. It is clear that specific wavelengths of light will kill more E. coli more efficiently than others.
Author Response
Please see attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Authors are discussing factors affecting bacteria survival that has been focused at large scale while, the essay is in contrast with the title. Unc and Goss (2004), Bradford et al (2013), and Engström et al., (2013) have discussed transport, retention and release of bacteria in agricultural settings soil and porous media. They have also provided a review on bacteria survival. Here microphysical habitat concept has not been addressed through the text. I expected to see a greater discussion on E. coli fate emphasized on microphysical habitats. Secondary habitats is defined but no where has been addressed or discussed microphysical habitats, and the essay has changed to another route which mostly addresses waters at the large scale where lakes are discussed. It is very important to consider microphysical habitats. Nutrient and nutrient availability (section 2.6) should be investigated in more detailed.
Authors have considered relevant factors for this review; however, they should polish text so that nicely addresses which secondary habitat environments they would like to focus. In other words, I think authors should utilize from secondary microphysical habitat term very much better. It is not clear! They go through waters and back to soil and then go to waters and/or sometimes very irrelevant. For example; In 2.1. 2.1. Temperature section, water environments are addressed, while, they have cited a reference about meat to prove temperature is primary factor of bacteria survival. Well, they should decide where they would like to focus; soil, sediment, water and/or further environments such as foods. The manuscript should be better organized in this regards. Primary factors influence bacteria are water content and temperature in soil and water. Authors should also utilize a wider reference lists where they are discussing 2.2. Solar Insolation. They have used only one reference (#25) in this section. They have filled this part only by giving an example from Lake Michigan. Also, effect of matric potential is incorrectly explained.
I suggest authors to write a paragraph as the hypothesis (after line 81) to clearly prove what has been missed in the previous reviews and the scale and the environments where they would like to focus. This should be also mentioned in abstract in brief as well.
After a major revision, the results are suitable for publication in Water and will increase the knowledge about soil bacteria fate in secondary microphysical habitats. The further comments are given in the following.
Tittle:
The title is interesting, but the text does not address microphysical habitats.
Abstract
It is well organized and covers the subject as well as text aims. However, again microphysical habitat is missed.
Keywords; Please delete Escherichia coli as used in title. Bacteria instead, please.
Line 31; Escherichia coli abbreviation is E. coli so Please put E .coli in the parenthesis here and elsewhere as is common in the literatures.
Line 50-59; This paragraph should address pathogen bacteria.
Line 54; delete E. coli
Line 56; microorganisms.
Line 72; animals but not organisms
Line 79; microorganisms
Line 90-92; please check soil and water environment references,
Line 94: E. coli should be italic
Line 97, 99,101-102,108, 111; please make all characters subscript
Line 154; impacts
Line 163; please make space after data depths.
Line 164; a space after parenthesis is needed.
Line 197; C and C0 represent current and initial concentrations. Please correct
Line 216; Precipitations
Line 218; delete space made before during….
Line 221; have you chose the character Ks for coefficient of increase? This makes reader confuse as can be found as saturated hydraulic conductivity.
Line 223; increase of what?
Line 236-240; Please check super- and subscripts patterns both in text and formula, here and elsewehre.
Line 240; Where is R? I do not see it in formula? In addition, what is that? I think that should be given in lowercase shape if it is hydraulic radius.
Line 259; even people have worked at column scales those could be the environment. However, here you would like to focus at large scale. If so, please rephrase.
Line 296; delete also
Line 297; habitats
Line 299; delete fecal and the e.g. E. coli
Line 300; after how long?
Line 308-309; Wrong! I understand what you meant, as this is a common unintentional mistake in writing, but, this phrase is wrong because when you say water potential less than -0.1 MPa means for example -0.2, -5, -10 ….to ….-∞. Please, look at the following sentence where you have correctly addressed matric potential effect.
Lines 311-313; delete, it has been repeated in the previous sentence.
Line 382; according to which guidelines e.g. EPA?
Line 406-407; Why? A short sentence would be nice to satisfy reader.
References
Self-citations are reasonable and fitted well to the topic of the review.
References #16 and 48 are relevant to food science.
Why Reference #66 is cited? This has addressed herbicides. If you would like to raise modeling then you can cite a better relevant ones so that address transport of bacteria at watershed.
Please check these review papers (Unc and Goss, 2004; Bradford et al.,2013; Engström et al., 2013).
1-Transport of bacteria from manure and protection of water resources
2- Transport and Fate of Microbial Pathogens in Agricultural Settings
3- Water Transport, Retention, and Survival of Escherichia coli in Unsaturated Porous Media: A Comprehensive Review of Processes, Models, and Factors
Author Response
Please see attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Thanks for considering the comments. I think the text can be consideration for publication after considering the following comments provided below.
Line 22; microorganism
Line 27; secondary habitat is given in title; delete.
Line 52; This statistics is 1.7 M in your cited ref (9) and 3.4 M in WHO website; why do you reported 2 M? Do have further citation?
Line 171; hour
Line 172,172, 328 and elsewhere; Please replace parentheses with bracket.
Line 175; E. coli should be italic here and elsewhere
Lines 249-259; Please correct superscripts for N/M2 and N/M3
Line 369-372; Please make consistent the subscripts in eq 21.
Line 443; lease replace parentheses with bracket.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
