Dynamics of Physicochemical Properties, Flavor, and Microbial Communities of Salt-Free Bamboo Shoots during Natural Fermentation: Correlation between Microorganisms and Metabolites

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is an interesting paper and I do not have any concerns that it needs any changes made. I did wonder if you might consider citing these two references which to me seem to compliment what you have found but in different materials:

Hon g Li, Fang Liu, Gabriella Kun-Farkas & Zsuzsanna Kiss (2015) Quantitative Analysis of Flavor Volatiles in Beer Using Headspace Solid-Phase Microextraction and Gas Chromatography–Flame Ionization Detection (HS-SPME-GC-FID), Journal of the American Society of Brewing Chemists, 73:3, 261-265, DOI: 10.1094/ASBCJ-2015-0618-01  (Link-  https://doi.org/10.1094/ASBCJ-2015-0618-01 )

Saša Drakula, Nikolina Čukelj Mustač, Dubravka Novotni, Bojana Voučko, Marina Krpan, Mirjana Hruškar, Duška Ćurić (2022)  Optimization and Validation of a HS‑SPME/GC–MS Method for the Analysis of Gluten‑Free Bread Volatile Flavor Compounds,  Food Analytical Methods 15:1155–1170

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you very much for considering our manuscript for publication in the journal Fermentation. We are very grateful for your recognition of our work. We have carefully read the two articles you provided, which have been of great help to us. We have cited these two articles and refer to the revised manuscript for details.

We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript. These changes will not influence the content and framework of the paper. And here we did not list the changes but marked in red in the revised manuscript. We appreciate for your warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval.

Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.

Yours sincerely,

Xiaofeng Xu,

College of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture,

College of Life Sciences and Engineering

Southwest University of Science and Technology, Mianyang 621010, China

Email: [email protected]

Reviewer 2 Report

In the manuscript, authors describe the dynamics of physicochemical properties, flavor, and microbial communities of bamboo shoots during natural fermentation. The research idea is good and the study design is well explained. However, there are some shortcomings in the manuscript that needs to corrected before recommendation for publication.

Abstract:

Include more details about the methodology, the present version of the abstract is more or less only describes the results. The conclusion should be drawn based on the work done, however, the authors wrote the conclusion that their study provides the theoretical basis for screening flavor-enhancing microorganisms without determining whether the microorganisms detected were responsible for flavor enhancement or the constituents present in the bamboo. This statement needs to be corrected.

Introduction:

What do authors mean to say when they write ‘with a long history”?

The last paragraph of the introduction is better to be placed in the methods section.

Starting from  “In this study, fresh bamboo shoots were fermented in water bottles filled with min- 59 eral water for 60 days. Flavor compounds,………………”.

The line spacing is not uniform in the introduction section.

Methods
How much for the sample collected each day? Was the study developed by authors or adopted from an earlier study? If it’s taken from somewhere, give references in section 2.1.

How many samples were repeated for each parameter each day like 1st, 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th, and 60th day?

Results and discussion

There are three figures under figure 1, each needs to be cited preferably.

The authors mentioned in 2.8 that they did not statistics and kept P values less than 0.05 to consider significance, but I could not find any comparison in figures or the text to explain whether there is any significant change from day 1 to the other days on different parameters. Needs to be compared and discussed while explaining the results in this section.

Conclusion

I suggest authors separate the results from the discussion, otherwise, let them include a summary, rather than giving a big conclusion. The conclusion should be ideally in 4-5 sentences as a ‘take-home message’. Most of the explanations given in this section are repetitions of the previous section.

minor correction needed, especially in the introduction section.

Author Response

Response to Reviewers Comments

Manuscript No: fermentation-2544660

TITLE: Dynamics of physicochemical properties, flavor, and microbial communities of salt-free bamboo shoots during natural fermentation: Correlation between microorganisms and metabolites

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you very much for the consideration of our manuscript to be published in the Fermentation. I accept and appreciate your comments, which are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made a correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion is marked in red in the manuscript. The main corrections in the manuscript and the response to your comments are as flowing:

Comments:

Point 1: Include more details about the methodology, the present version of the abstract is more or less only describes the results. The conclusion should be drawn based on the work done, however, the authors wrote the conclusion that their study provides the theoretical basis for screening flavor-enhancing microorganisms without determining whether the microorganisms detected were responsible for flavor enhancement or the constituents present in the bamboo. This statement needs to be corrected.

Response 1: Thank you for your professional guidance, we have added more details about the methodology of the abstract. In addition, we modified the statement “This study provides a theoretical basis for screening flavor-enhancing microorganisms as fer-mentation agents in sour bamboo shoots, which can contribute to the improvement of their quality.” to “A detailed picture of the microbial community of fermented bamboo shoots has been provided by this study, and it may provide insight into the Chinese traditional fermented vegetable microbial structure.”.

Point 2: What do authors mean to say when they write ‘with a long history”?

Response 2: Many thanks for the comments and remind. We have removed this ambiguous phrase.

Point 3: The last paragraph of the introduction is better to be placed in the methods section. Starting from  “In this study, fresh bamboo shoots were fermented in water bottles filled with min- 59 eral water for 60 days. Flavor compounds,………………”.

Response 3: As the reviewer’s suggestion, we have removed the last paragraph of the introduction.

Point 4: The line spacing is not uniform in the introduction section.

Response 4: As the reviewer’s suggestion, we have made modifications to the line spacing in the Introduction section to ensure consistency.

Point 5: How much for the sample collected each day? Was the study developed by authors or adopted from an earlier study? If it’s taken from somewhere, give references in section 2.1.

Response 5: For sampling, three unopened bottles were selected at random each time, and references have been placed in section 2.1.

Point 6: How many samples were repeated for each parameter each day like 1st, 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th, and 60th day?

Response 6: Three unopened bottles were selected at random each time, so we have taken three portions.

Point 7: There are three figures under figure 1, each needs to be cited preferably.

Response 7: As the reviewer’s suggestion, we have cited three figures under Figure 1.

Point 8: The authors mentioned in 2.8 that they did not statistics and kept P values less than 0.05 to consider significance, but I could not find any comparison in figures or the text to explain whether there is any significant change from day 1 to the other days on different parameters. Needs to be compared and discussed while explaining the results in this section.

Response 8: Thank you for your careful guidance, we have explained the significance below the caption. In addition, we partially annotated the significance in the text (Lines 155, 171). There are also some explanations in the text for the changes that have occurred, For example, “the hardness of pickled bamboo shoots significantly (P < 0.05) decreases within the first 1-14 days and slowly decreases from day 14 to day 60. Similarly, the fracturability and chewiness of pickled bamboo shoots gradually decrease in a relatively stable and slow manner (Figure 1B, C). The softening of pickled bamboo shoots may be caused by a de-crease in cell membrane permeability due to the pH decrease during fermentation or by the hydrolysis of native pectin in pickled bamboo shoots (Liu, Food and Fermentation Industries, 2022)”

Point 9: I suggest authors separate the results from the discussion, otherwise, let them include a summary, rather than giving a big conclusion. The conclusion should be ideally in 4-5 sentences as a ‘take-home message’. Most of the explanations given in this section are repetitions of the previous section.

Response 9: Many thanks for your professional suggestion. We have streamlined the conclusion.

We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript. These changes will not influence the content and framework of the paper. And here we did not list the changes but marked in red in the revised manuscript. We appreciate for your warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval.

Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.

Yours sincerely,

Xiaofeng Xu,

College of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture,

College of Life Sciences and Engineering

Southwest University of Science and Technology, Mianyang 621010, China

Email: [email protected]