Optimized Si-H Content and Multivariate Engineering of PMHS Antifoamers for Superior Foam Suppression in High-Viscosity Systems

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Structure-Tuned PMHS-Based Antifoaming Agents: Tailoring Backbone, Chain Length, and Terminal Group for Performance in Viscous Systems

 

This work introduces a structure-function-guided formulation strategy, based on poly(methylhydrosiloxane) as a core siloxane matrix, to overcome the issue of limited long-term foam suppression efficiency. Despite efforts by the authors, the work contains some problems that need to be addressed as follows:

1. The title is fussy and uninformative. Please, change it
2. What were these chain lengths (e.g., 10, 40, 70, and 100) based on? Please, add a reference if it is based on published work
3. (Polymerization was conducted under nitrogen…….) Again, what were these steps and conditions based on? Add references.
4. Why such high drying temperature and time (120°C for 2 hours)! How much was the sample? What type of dryer was used (e.g., vacuum drier, oven, or microwave)? Please elaborate on this and provide references. Also, add specifications for each device used in this study (model, country of origin).
5. Add dilatated information for each of the used materials (e.g., purity, boiling point, specific gravity, ..and supplier).
6. In the results and discussion section, we can only see the results presented without a thorough discussion of the obtained results or the use of supporting references to solidify the achieved results.
7. Figure 4/What was the standard deviation of these measurements!! Why this wide range of error bars!

 

                                                                             

Author Response

We appreciate the reviewer’s invaluable comments. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions highlighted with yellow background in the re-submitted files.

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Comments:

Reviewer appreciates the authors' effort in presenting the article with interesting results. The body of the text and the accompanying figures are clear and well-structured. However, a few comments need to be addressed before the manuscript can be recommended for final evaluation.

1. Specify the novelty of your work clearly in the introduction.
2. What is the necessity of surface treatment at 170 °C?
3. Explain why the Si-H bending has almost diminished in the M-D30-T1-L2 sample, and why it also shows a different NMR spectrum.
4. Describe how the polydispersity index was analyzed.
5. Justify why the Td20 under N₂ atmosphere is high in the TGA measurement.
6. Line 300: The authors claim the disappearance of bands, but the spectrum clearly shows their presence (2960). Please clarify. Also, explain why the peak at 912 cm⁻¹ has almost disappeared after washing. Does chloroform significantly affect Si–CH₃ stretching?
7. In lines 205–206, the band at 912 cm⁻¹ is assigned to Si–H, whereas in line 302, it is attributed to S–CH₃. clarify this inconsistency.
8. Can the authors recommend these materials for large-scale production? What are the potential limitations?

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions highlighted with yellow background in the re-submitted files.

Please see the attachment.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf