Enzyme-Assisted Ultrasonic Extraction of Total Flavonoids from Acanthopanax senticosus and Their Enrichment and Antioxidant Properties
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This original article addresses a subject of great interest: new and improved extraction methods for pharmacologically active compounds of plant origin. It also assesses the antioxidant potential of the various extract fractions. The study might be useful to readers and researchers interested in: nutraceuticals, pharmacy, medicine, chemistry, botany, food industry.
It deserves to be published in Processes, however, there are several points in which improvements should be made to strengthen the manuscript.
1) The introduction gives a short description of A. senticosus and its traditional benefits for human health. Please add the common name of the plant, the risks of overharvesting roots from spontaneous flora and advantages/disadvantages related to the cultivation of medicinal plants.
2) Section 2.1. Materials - Please include information about the plant material, the type of water and the other substances that have not been mentioned (E.g.: citric acid, ethanol, vitamin C etc.)
3) Line 81 - The ultrasonic extraction method is mentioned, but there is no literature reference or any parameter. Please offer further information.
4) Line 100 – How was done the pH adjustment? Please offer further information.
5) Section 2.2.5.1. Enrichment of flavonoids by solvents of different polarities – Please include the volume ratio of water suspension : extraction solvent.
6) Line 146 - The Pearson correlation method is mentioned, but there is no literature reference. Please add the reference.
7) Lines 289-290 – Contradictory information regarding the polysaccharides content.
8) Line 305 – In Figure 3 it is difficult to distinguish between the grey tones of each category of active ingredients. I would suggest the use of patterns or full colour.
9) The presence of a section dedicated exclusively to Conclusions would be valuable to the readers.
10) The References writing style is inconsistent.
11) Typing errors:
Line 28 Insert space after “)”
Lines 28 – 29 Italics
Line 31 “A. senticosus it has been”, delet “it”
Lines 51-52 rephrase “which can effectively promote the release of active ingredients from plants using cellulases, hemi-cellulases, and pectinases” with “from which cellulases, hemi-cellulases, and pectinases can effectively promote the release of active ingredients”.
Line 60 Delete “in the extract”, replace “of” with “using”
Line 62 Delete “clinical”
Line 93 Replace “Optimize” with “Optimization of”
Line 207 and line 214 Delete “5”
Lines 229-232 Insert space after ”,” and after “;”. Replace “is the quadratic” with “are the quadratic” and “is interaction factors” with “are interaction factors”
Line 240 Delete ”from”
Line 264 Replace “relative to” with “associated with”
Line 269 Move “;” after “time”
Lines 275-276 Italics
Line 354 Delete the “s” in “contributes”
Line 363 Insert “.” in “0929”
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The manuscript titled “Enzyme-Assisted Ultrasonic Extraction of Total Flavonoids from Acanthopanax senticosus and Their Enrichment and Antioxidant Properties” covers an interesting topic. Applied extraction techniques are appropriate for this purpose however there are several issues which should be addressed.
Page 2 Line 75 – Please explain which is the origin of the dry A. senticosus powder. Was it purchased, if yes where and provide additional information like water content, if possible average diameter of particles. If it was produced in laboratory from fresh plant, which was the procedure, water content etc. Which plant organ was used, xylem?
Page 2 Line 76 – which was the quantity of buffer?
Please explain why enrichment step was performed after the optimization part. Solvent selection can be variable for optimization. It seems that 50% ethanol was used for extractions in optimization part (sections 2.2.3.and 2.2.4). Extract obtained with optimal conditions (with ethanol) was then re-extracted with a set of solvents. Wouldn’t it be better to use directly petrol ether, chloroform etc without step with ethanol extraction? Because when ethanol is used in the first step, due to different affinity it favourizes extraction of some compounds. So it is not possible to truly understand the power of different solvents.
Page 2 Line 79 – Please explain why filtrate wasn’t tested on flavonoid content? Some of the flavonoids might be extracted with the buffer.
Page 3 Lines 96-100 – The sentence is confusing, a mixture of cellulase and pectinase was fixed at 3000 U/g but there is also complex enzyme up to 200 U/g. Please clarify it re rephrase the sentence.
Work flow is a bit confusing as there are many steps, please provide scheme with all experimental steps
Figure 1. It is unclear which were other conditions, e.g. fig 1e. Flavonoids were in function of enzymatic time but which were other parameters (pH, temperature, enzyme quantity etc.) or fig 1g Flavonoids were in function of temperature which were values for pH, time, enzyme quantity? It needs more clarification on Figure 1 and in section 2.2.3
Page 8 Lines 253-257 – Interaction of enzyme quantity and temperature were significant and interaction of enzyme treatment time and temperature… Please rephrase the entire sentence.
Page 8 Line 276 – I assume that word “polar” is redundant as petroleum ether is not considered as polar solvent.
Page 9 Lines 288-289 – This sentence is incorrect, please rephrase it.
Page 12 Lines 393-394 – It is true, but this was not tested in study so it shouldn’t be commented in discussion section.
Page 12 line 417 – Please give a full term for Vc and add it in chemicals section.
Typos and English:
Page 1 Line 31- Chinese traditional medicine
Page 1 Line 40 – and thus are
Page 5 Line 207 – so the total
Page 5 Line 215 - Each
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors did improve their manuscript and answered the majority of inquiries from both reviewers. The manuscript can be accepted for publication.
