Effects of Extreme Root Restriction on the Nutritional and Flavor Quality, and Sucrose Metabolism of Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article has serious shortcomings in terms of acceptance for publication in such a prestigious journal.

Latin name should be added in the title.

Please add there is no numerical data in the summary.

introductory part

Add a paragraph such as the world production value of tomato, the production value in China, the importance of its herbal properties in terms of human health.

There is complexity in the sentence given on line 31. That is, vegetative characteristics are affected by various factors such as variety, climate, soil characteristics, cultural processes. Revise the sentence like this.

material and method

Add the geographical coordinates of the place where the greenhouse is located.

Add the device information where the humidity and temperature values are measured.

Conclusion and discussion

Correlation analyzes should be performed between the parameters examined in the study.

In addition, PCA analyzes should be performed.

In such a comprehensive study, only 39 references were added, and adding more references would contribute to the scientific aspect of the study.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Review report for the article

Horticulturae -2483706

The manuscript entitles “Effects of extremely root restriction on the nutritional and flavor quality, and sucrose metabolism of tomatoes” has been written well and have some comments below:

In abstract Line no 16: Rephrase the sentence “The ERR enhanced accumulation of metabolites in tomato fruits involving glycolytic pathway  to the tricarboxylic acid cycle then to the synthesis of amino acid, vitamin C, lycopene, and polyphenol, which was caused by ‘concentration effect’ occurred with reduction of fruit size”.

In general, authors need to improve the abstract. The language is also need improvement in not only abstract but also throughout the manuscript.

In Keywords section, Keywords must be different from the title and in alphabetical order.

In Introduction part, authors need to provide the latest production and productivity data of the tomato.

Line no 37; In Introduction part, please rephrase the sentence.

Line no 40; In Introduction part, What do you mean about “less N reserve in grapes”.

Authors need to mention about the number of plants per replication they have used for the study?

Also need to mention how many replication per experiment they have used in this study?

In gene expression, how many biological and technical replications they have used?

In line no 174, what do you mean about Thirdly, stem diameter below the CI and CIII ?

In figure 1, for fruit weight, why authors not did any statistical analysis? If they have done then please mention the error bar.

Please correct the plants/m2 like plants/m² throughout the MS.

Conclusions are very well written. It would be nice if final recommendation could be made in the end.

References should be according to the journals guideline. And follow same format for all the references. Like Line no 533, Journal of Experimental Botany should be in format;

Line no 539, Chinese Journal of Biotechnology should be in format.

English language must be improved in throughout the manuscript.

Authors need to improve the english language in the MS.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The Manuscript Effects of extremely root restriction on the nutritional and flavor quality, and sucrose metabolism of tomatoes by Danxia Liu, Jinxiang Chen, Yanwei Hao, Xiaolong Yang, Riyuan Chen, Yiting Zhang contains an interesting study related to the analysis of the size of the effect of the root system on the quality and tomato fruit size.

The work is designed in accordance with the requirements.

However, there are some minor remarks. So I would like to see photographs of whole plants, root systems and tomato fruits obtained in the experiment. In addition, it is desirable to describe the experimental methodology in more detail, since this is important for this work and the reference cannot completely remove questions about the methodological approach to watering, plant fastening, and care regimen.

I would also like to see a detailed description of the differences in the structural organization of the root system.

It is desirable to discuss changes in sugar content, properties and size in terms of changes in structure and ploidy. Which, as you know, in a tomato is associated with the size of the fetus.

Related links:

Singh, H., Kumar, P., Chaudhari, S., & Edelstein, M. (2017). Tomato grafting: a global perspective. HortScience, 52(10), 1328-1336.

Chaban, I. A., Kononenko, N. V., Gulevich, A. A., Bogoutdinova, L. R., Khaliluev, M. R., & Baranova, E. N. (2020). Morphological features of the anther development in tomato plants with non-specific male sterility. Biology, 9(2), 32.

Cantero-Navarro, E., Romero-Aranda, R., Fernández-Muñoz, R., Martínez-Andújar, C., Pérez-Alfocea, F., & Albacete, A. (2016). Improving agronomic water use efficiency in tomato by rootstock-mediated hormonal regulation of leaf biomass. Plant Science, 251, 90-100.

Another disadvantage is the absence in Scheme 6 of comparisons with the conventional growing method. If the authors do not want to change this scheme, it should be attributed to the discussion, and not to the results.

On the whole, the presented manuscript contains interesting new information and may be published.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Ms is ready for publication

Reviewer 2 Report

Now paper is good and must be publish as it.

Reviewer 3 Report

Manuscript Effects of extremely root restriction on the nutritional and flavor quality, and sucrose metabolism of tomatoes by authors

Danxia Liu , Jinxiang Chen , Yanwei Hao , Xiaolong Yang , Riyuan Chen , Yiting Zhang has been substantially revised.

I think that the work can be accepted, but the rulers in Figure S2 are almost invisible.