Cactus Cladode Juice as Bioflocculant in the Flocculation-Thickening Process for Phosphate Washing Plant: A Comparative Study with Anionic Polyacrylamide
, Khadija Lalam 1,3, Yasser Harmen 1,3,*, Abdelaziz El Morabit 1, Younes Chhiti 1,3, Ahmed Chebak 1 and Mohammed Benssitel 2
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is preliminary research and only shows the potential of the topic. Both the experimental part (there is no detailed description of the reagents and procedures used) and the resulting part require thorough improvement. The conclusions are not scientific and are based on assumptions or knowledge from literature reports.
other suggesstions:
in the first place in the manuscript there are editing errors and incorrect formatting in terms of the systematic name of the plant, units, numbers and their decimal separators, reference to the drawings. There are errors in the numbering of the Figures.
Rate of sedymentation should be expressed in a unit of rate, not percentage. Moreover, the results in this respect are doubled (Figure 5 and Table 3).
It is not clear "specific consumption of the bioflocculant"
the composition of the biofloculate should be given in the experimental part
The double description of the charts is incomprehensible,
FT-IR spectrum shown as "Figure 10. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy spectra of flocculants." it is either poorly made or shows bad relationships. These types of drawings should also show both spectra at a considerable distance from each other.
the authors include the obvious calculations in the manuscript
group names of chemical compounds are capitalized, e.g. Carbohydrates.
the comments on the presented results are poor and do not correlate with the results e.g. comments to Figure 8, 10,
Author Response
Please find here the reviewer report inserting all reviewer's comments.
We would like to thank the reviewer for their constructive remarks.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Reviewer report
ENNAWAOUI et al. explored the thickness process for phosphate washing using cactus cladode juice as bioflocculant. It seems to be an important study. However, the following suggestions are recommended:
i. At the beginning of the abstract, the author can state shortly why this study was important and in the last sentence, author can state the future prospects of this study.
ii. The abstract needs to be updated including numerical findings and comparison if any.
iii. In the last paragraph of the introduction, the author needs to clearly state the novelty of this paper together with the prospects of this study.
iv. In conclusion, the author needs to articulate the limitations, prospects, and future direction of research in the current topics to make the study stand alone.
v. Authors must follow the journal format fully in the case of the Reference list. For example, Journal abbreviations, heading, and subheadings, etc.
vi. In the result and discussion section, the author needs to pay more attention and validate their findings with recent previous results and compare if possible.
vii. All Figure caption have to be updated including detailed experimental conditions as precisely as possible. A similar correction is needed for the Table title. The presentation of both Figure and Table needs to be improved.
viii. The conclusion part also needs revision to make it catchy to the reader with an indication of future research in this area.
Author Response
Please find here the reviewer report inserting all reviewer's comments.
We would like to thank the reviewer for their constructive remarks.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The paper titled
Cactus cladode juice as bioflocculant in the flocculation - thick-2 ening process for phosphate washing plant: a comparative 3 study with anionic polyacrylamide addressed attractive work but its look simple experiments were conducted
1. The abstract should have quantitates and qualitative results
2. The work supposes to be conducted with modelling studies
3. Mechanism of the flocculation should be explained
4. Methodology should be supported with refs
5. Need more critical discussion for the results
Author Response
Please find here the reviewer report inserting all reviewer's comments.
We would like to thank the reviewer for their constructive remarks.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
good
Author Response
The authors thank the reviewer for providing suggestions and comments to improve the document.
Reviewer 2 Report
Authors have attempted to improve the impact of the manuscript to a notable extent in the revised version.
Author Response
The authors thank the reviewer for providing suggestions and comments to improve the document.
Reviewer 3 Report
the paper has been revised but still could not find the mathematical models, without models study or advanced analysis for the materials using SEM, AFM, XRD and others the paper quality is low and has no new contribution, please note numerical data only is not enough to support the applicability
Author Response
The comments and suggestions of the reviewer are relevant to improving the paper. The literature presents the cactus juice as a bioflocculant for the treatment of discharges loaded with heavy metals and wastewater treatment. Indded, today's world expects the implementation of green chemistry principles to reduce and eliminate the use or generation of environmentally harmful substances. Hence, several countries have decided to stop the use of industrial flocculants. Given these facts, this research paper presents the cactus juice as a bioflocculant in the flocculation-thickening process of phosphate washing plants. The processed samples are of industrial quality. The comparative study between the natural and industrial flocculant showed that cactus bioflocculant provides a good flocculating performance. Currently, the authors are working on the advanced characterization of the phenomenological process of bioflocculation using AFM, DRX, SEM and other techniques. Also, the authors work on the modelization and optimization of the flocculation – thickening parameters of phosphate washing plant using experimental design methodology.
