Microbial Exudates as Biostimulants: Role in Plant Growth Promotion and Stress Mitigation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Review report “jox-2566578”

In the manuscript entitled “Microbial exudates as biostimulants: Role in plant growth promotion and stress mitigation” the authors propose a comprehensive review about microbial exudates and their composition, applications and mode of action of active substances.

The manuscript is well written, organized in a logical way and deals with the subject in great detail. The length is appropriate. The topic is interesting and the idea to present a review is really good. I have some comments and suggestions for the authors:

Abstract:

The abstract is quite clear and sufficiently reflects the manuscript content, however I suggest author modify it, in the final part and better explain the purpose of the review.

Introduction:
- In this section there aren’t references and in the following section references start from 25. So probably there is a problem.

- Line 58 introduce here the acronym VOCs

- Lines 77-78 search for the correct way to report this regulation and add it as reference.

 

Section 2:
 - Line 118 when introduce element symbols for the first time use the complete name. Check it along the manuscript, as well as pay attention with the correct way to write the ions.

- Use the italics for microorganisms, plant species etc (e.g. lines 126,127,128,129, 138-142, 147, 184,189…)

- in this part something is missing. I suggest authors add a figure or two ones for introducing exudates constituents (siderophores, AAs, EPS, organic acids, hormones …). This will make the reading easier.

 

Section 3:

This part is the weakest in the manuscript. Try to improve it.

- Line 291: add references

- Line 297: add references

- table 1 adjust it and introduce the acronyms as a footer. (the same for other tables).

 

Section 4:

This section in some parts is high repetitive.

4.2.1. Defense Against Plant Pathogens: this part is not accurate at all and need to be improved. There are many microorganisms used as “plant protection products” and the mode of actions of their active metabolites are well defined. Here some recent references authors may use:

- https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2023.1040901

- https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-823355-9.00023-7

- https://doi.org/10.1080/10408398.2022.2087594

- https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-323-88478-5.00002-X

 

- Moreover, as the authors know, in many legislations microbial active substances can currently be approved as pesticides (e.g. In Europe see regulation (EC) No 1107/2009). There are many reports and guidelines. In this section one or two sentences about the improve of the use of microorganisms and their metabolites as an objective of the European Green Deal may be added.

 

References:

There are too many references and some of them are not properly related with the topic. So, I suggest authors eliminate improper references.

Based on these comments I strongly encourage the authors to improve the manuscript, since it may be a good candidate for publication in Journal of Xenobiotics after the revisions.

Moderate editing of English language is required

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you for your invaluable review. Please find our response attached.

Thank you

Abdul

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

This article presents a very comprehensive review on microbial exudates and their role as biostimulants in plants. I find it very well written, the only observation is to write in italics all the scientific names that are mentioned.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for your invaluable review. Please find our response attached.

Thank you

Abdul

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

In my point of view this manuscript is written very well, only need is writing into italic of genus and species of microorganisms.

Reviewer

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for your invaluable review. Please find our response attached.

Thank you

Abdul

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 4 Report

I really enjoyed reading this review paper. It describes important aspects related to biostimulants from microbial exudates. 

Unfortunately I do not have any comments that might improved the work. 

The only concern is the presentation of the tables in the text. They are difficult to read them due to the size of the font. Probably this has to be change directly by the MPDI production editorial. I would recommend that should be located in only one page for each table.  

Author Response

Dear Reviewer, 

Thank you for your invaluable review. As per your suggestions, we have incorporated all the corrections you mentioned in the revised MS.

Thank you

Abdul

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors did a fairly good/decent work of revision. However they do not address several reviewers' comments/suggestions.

There are some typos and grammar imperfections.

Author Response

Reviewers Comment: The authors did a fairly good/decent work of revision. However, they do not address several reviewers' comments/suggestions.

Response: We appreciate the reviewers' feedback. We have carefully reviewed the comments and addressed the remaining ones in the revised manuscript. Your input is invaluable in improving the quality of our work. Thank you for your patience and guidance in this process.

Reviewer's comment: There are some typos and grammar imperfections.

Response: As per the reviewer's suggestions, we have implemented a thorough proofreading and editing process to rectify these issues in the revised manuscript.