Microbial Diversity of Marula Wine during Spontaneous Fermentation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript by Maluleke et al. presented studies concerning the characterization of microbial diversity of bacterial and yeast communities in marula wine. The study is interesting and the manuscript is generally well-designed, well-structured, and written. However, I have some questions concerning especially the methodology section. It would be advisable to make some corrections before accepting:

 

1. If I understand well – the wine samples were taken on different days for different experimental variants. This significantly limits the possibility of discussing the results. Please give the reason for this. 
2. Figure 1 is unclear to me. It looks like you conducted two independent fermentations. What MTZ and SKK mean? According to the text above, I suspect that they are frutti samples, but it is unclear to the readers. Moreover – you must mention that in the case of culture-dependent analysis, you characterize the culturable fraction of microbiota. 
3. Next-Generation sequencing technology subsection - how did The Authors test the quantity and quality of isolated DNA?
4. In all figures descriptions like MLT, MST, SKB, etc must be explained in the description. Moreover, the „LAB” variant designation can be confusing because of the lactic acid bacteria abbreviation. 
5. Figure 4, Figure 5, and Figure 6– please explain (or change the designation) of samples e.g. MLT16S10. It is unclear to the readers. 
6. Please add the conclusion section. 
7. Please provide the assession number to raw NGS sequences deposited in the database (SRA database, GeneBank, or other)

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

Thank you for dedicating your time and expertise to review our manuscript. We greatly appreciate your valuable suggestions and insightful inputs, which we have thoroughly considered and diligently incorporated to enhance the overall quality of the manuscript. For your convenience, we have attached a report detailing our responses and the changes made in response to your feedback.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,

Maluleke E 

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

 

Dear 

the manuscript is very important but some comments need to correct  

1- Some words in italic form (Not scientific names)  in line 30

2- Reduce the key words

3-  transfer the aim of work at end of introduction

4- mention the taxonomist which identify the used plant and plant No in herbarium

5- line 104, please   write the city and country of University of Limpopo campus

6-  in line 122  :  at 5000 rpm to collect the microbial cells.  For time ……..

7- line 141 WL Nutrient agar, this medium for yeast isolation !!!

8-  why Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus cereus were detected in the marula wines during the early stages of fermentation

9- Meyerozyma caribbica was detected at the late stage (days 11 – 24) in some of the wine samples. What the differences

10- how Cyanobacteria detected from wines, namely LAB     (cyanobacteria  its blue green algae  depend  on light

11- line 302  Cyanobacteria was or were

12- Lactobacillales, Enterobacterales, Rhodospirillales, Streptophyta, : these orders or class please uniform the written

13-  in the introduction please refer to β-Diversity

14- Lactic acid bacteria and Acetic acid change to lactic acid bacteria and acetic acid , etc in all manuscript

15-  line 347  give examples of organic acid  produced from the lactic acid bacteria

16- line 365 :  give examples of Non-fermenting yeasts that play  role in the initial stages of fermentation

17-  line 368 : from day 2 please change to at 2^nd day

18- add part of conclusion

 

  

Dear Editor

The paper accept after a major revision 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

Thank you for dedicating your time and expertise to review our manuscript. We greatly appreciate your valuable suggestions and insightful inputs, which we have thoroughly considered and diligently incorporated to enhance the overall quality of the manuscript. For your convenience, we have attached a report detailing our responses and the changes made in response to your feedback.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The Authors have improved the manuscript and have addressed all of my comments in the revised manuscript. The revised manuscript can be accepted.

Reviewer 2 Report

 Accept 

Minor editing of English language required