Design and Experimental Testing of an Overhead Rail Automatic Variable-Distance Targeted Spray System for Solar Greenhouses

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper designs and tests the hanging rail spray system for solar greenhouse, and the related research contents and conclusions have certain scientific value. Regarding the research in this article, there are suggestions and questions for modification, which require the author's response and modification:

1. As a design paper, it is recommended to add specific indicators of relevant performance parameters in the abstract section to better reflect the rigor and reference value of the paper.

2. There is a phenomenon of inconsistency in some annotations in the text, such as the letter in the explanation of equation (4) on page 9 being inconsistent with the letter in the equation, T should be changed to t; The name in equation (5) on page 14 should be consistent with the names in Figures 14 and 15;

3. Please provide an explanation of the software used by the author to process the data obtained from the experiment;

4. There is a lack of introduction to the limitations of the designed spray system, which should be supplemented in the discussion section to enable readers to have a clearer understanding of the follow-up research direction;

5. What is the relationship between the spray distance and the liquid drug adhesion rate, and what is the basis?

6. Please specify which growth stage or stages of plant spraying needs the spray system designed in this paper meets.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

i have been gone through this article and recommend this article for publication. The hanging-rail automatic variable-distance target spray
system described in this paper can improve the adhesion rate of chemical solution and reduce the amount of pesticide use.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you very much for your letter of 15 September, 2023, and your valuable comments on our paper entitled " Design and Experimental Testing of an Overhead-Rail Automatic Variable-Distance Targeted Spray System for Solar Greenhouses" (Manuscript ID: agriculture-2619946).

If you have any queries, please don’t hesitate to contact me at the address below.

Thank you and best regards.

Yours sincerely,

DeFan Huang

E-mail: huangdefan@stu.hunau.edu.cn

Reviewer 3 Report

Review

Intensification of food production is one of the primary tasks of contemporary agriculture worldwide. Growing plants in greenhouses is a traditional, but progressive form of continuously innovated ways of this intensification. In these growing areas with the option of a precisely controlled growth environment, plants can be provided with optimal conditions to thrive and provide maximum yields. However, the plants located here are also affected by various negative effects, especially insect and fungal pests. Therefore, it is necessary to minimize these negative effects, while various methods of application of pesticide substances are used. However, pesticides are also an undesirable factor, as their residues can harm the health of humans - consumers of plants treated with pesticides. It is therefore desirable to strive for the minimization of the dosage of pesticides and the maximum accuracy of their application. And it is precisely this topic that is dealt with in the presented article, which introduces the results of a research solution to the targeted spraying of plants with pesticides. For the stated reasons, I therefore consider the topic of the presented article to be current and its content to be beneficial for contemporary agricultural science and practice.

Chapter 1 Introduction presents a solid overview of the current state of the issue. The authors draw their knowledge from the current publications of a number of renowned authors. From the above, it is clear that the predominant way of applying pesticides in greenhouses is using portable so-called backpack sprayers. However, this method of application shows significant shortcomings, especially in relation to the so-called three-dimensional method of growing plants (i.e. growing plants in floors located above each other). The authors of the article point to the possibility of improving the technical solution to this problem, using an automatic spraying system carried by suspended rails. The authors of the article designed an experimental version of such a system, built it and subjected it to thorough tests and measurements.

In chapter 2 Materials and Methods, the technical solution of the experimental spraying system carried on a suspended rail is presented in a clear and concise textual and graphic form. It is emphasized, among other things, that it is an automated construction principle with a differentiated distance of the spray nozzles from the treated plants in the individual levels of the growing floors. After the initial basic description of the new device in subsection 2.1, its more detailed characteristics follow in subsection 2.2. Subchapter 2.3 describes the details of the parameters of the spraying element (nozzle) and determining its optimal distance from the treated plants. At this point, I would like to ask the authors to clarify the description of the design of the spray nozzles used, i.e. whether they were "regular" nozzles, working on the principle of hydrodynamics, or whether so-called "low-thrust" or "bubble" nozzles were used, which provide both better coverage of the treated plants with drops of the pesticide solution and reduction of undesired flight of pesticide drops outside the treated plants. If the authors have not worked with such nozzles, I recommend that they at least mention their principles and effects in their article as a possibility. I have dealt with this issue in the past, and therefore I know that the design principle of the nozzle and its dimensions are of fundamental importance for the quality of the application of the pesticide solution. Subchapter 2.3 also explains the principles of automated flow control of the protective solution through the spraying system. Here, too, an understandable description is used, suitably supplemented by a graphic representation of the network diagram.

In chapter 3 Target Spray Test, the arrangement of the experimental equipment located in the greenhouse of the university is described, and the methodology of the experiments can also be recognized here. This part of the article is also prepared in a comprehensible way and is appropriately supplemented with visual material. Among other things, I would like to emphasize here the ingenious principle of monitoring and evaluating the quality of plant leaf surface coverage with drops of pesticide solution (see e.g. the text on page 13 and pictures 11 and 12. In this chapter, several pages also show the established results of the experiments, processed in the form tables, graphs and commenting texts.From the above it is clear that the proposed spraying mechanism has proven itself and that the assumption formulated at the beginning of the research has thus been fulfilled.

In chapter 4 Conclusions, the main findings presented in the article are succinctly summarized and I have no comments on them.

The last part of the article is References, which are processed in the usual form and correspond to the citations given in the previous parts of the text of the article.

Recommendation: the structure of the article corresponds only partially to the usual structure of scientific articles. I encourage authors to modify the structure of their article so that the "Results" chapter appears here. In my opinion, part of the text of chapter 3 (subchapter 3.1) should be included in ch. 2 – because it is a description of the environment in which the experiments took place. Subchapter 3.2 should therefore be labeled "Results". The "Discussion" chapter will probably have to be developed as a new one - the text of the article in its current form does not contain too much information of a discussion nature, and therefore it is not possible to just single out part of the text and mark it as Discussion (as it is possible to do, on the other hand, with the creation of the Results chapter – see earlier).

 

Otherwise, however, I think what I already stated at the beginning of this Review, i.e. that the article contains interesting information, is factually correct and would be beneficial for agricultural science and practice. After making adjustments in accordance with my comments, I recommend publishing the article as a scientific article.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx