Assessment of Water Quality in the Panama Canal Watershed Using Multivariate Analysis of Physicochemical and Biological Parameters

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Review

Assessment of water quality in the Panama Canal Watershed using multivariate analysis of physicochemical and biological  parameters

The article concerns a very important issue, namely the quality of water reservoirs, which are, i.a., a source of water supply for the population. The methodology is mostly described in great detail, however, there are some shortcomings, mainly in the illustrations side, which should be corrected before publication. Below are detailed comments.

1. The keywords seem to be poorly representative of the manuscript text. They concern methods rather than the main subject matter...
2. Correlation matrix (table 3) – no information on the significance level of the results... to be completed;
3. The illustration side of the article (figures and tables) requires significant refinement. Table 1 – no units; temperature with a capital letter is usually marked as that in Kelwins...; Figure 1- the map should include elements that the authors refer to in the manuscript text, including Gatun and Aqua Clara locks, mentioned rivers, etc.; the figure has dots and arrows without a legend, what do they mean, are these elements necessary? Table 2 – error in the name of the test; Figure 3 – no information on what the size of the dots corresponds to (only the color scale);
4. Line 255 and next – unclear description, more suitable for the next graph...
5. Lines 294 – 297 seem inconsistent with figure, right side? Furthermore, there is no sufficient explanation of which axis is 1 and which axis is 2.... Even seemingly obvious things should be clearly explained in the text or on the figure; furthermore, the methodology of performing the HJ – Biplot analysis is poorly described in contrast to the previous methods. It is required to add more details from the scope of the development of results by this method, so that there is balance in the text and all methods are written in a comparable scope.

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Title : Assessment of water quality in the Panama Canal Watershed using multivariate analysis of physicochemical and biological parameters

 

I found the paper original and interesting, so I support its publication in the journal after some minor but customary revisions that I think might increase the quality of the manuscript. However, I feel the paper needs especially to extend the section MM ; many details are needed. Also I cant find the biological aspect throughut the manuscript ! My comments and suggestions are reported below.

 

Specific recommendations :

-line 40: change the keywords: those existing in the title, and those having the same meaning. You need to make wider the axes of research for readers.

-lines 88-91: Clear objectives or questions must be given – what hypotheses authors are trying to test?

Fig.1. Add a scale to the map.

-lines 106-117: More details are needed in the Material and Methods section. The software used? Tests’ names? Transformation?

-Table 1. Are you doing measurements only once? Where are biological parameters!!

-Table 3. Is this Pearson or Spearman correlation? It is better to put probability values!!

-Figure 5: each table or figure must be read without the text. Fig 5 must indicate that the CA used Euclidean distance.

-In conclusion, you must give answers to questions you posed at the end of the introduction, a summary of the results found and the limitations of the study.

-References: check the format of all the references cited to align with MPDI criteria.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf