Use of Tangerine Waste as Fuel for the Generation of Electric Current
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
I think this manuscript can be accepted after minor revision and my comments are as follows
· Please improve quality of abstract
· Please improve last section of introduction section
· It is suggested to enhance conclusion
Author Response
Dear colleague, thank you very much for your comments.
All researchers have made the changes and have responded to each comment.
- Please improve quality of abstract
Ans.Several parts of the abstract were changed, mainly from line 17 to 22 and the English corrections.
- Please improve last section of introduction section
Ans. Several changes were made, such as in line 46 to 54, 74 to 78, 86 to 96.
- It is suggested to enhance conclusion
ANS. Added changes to the conclusion.
best regards
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
1. A careful language editing is required.
2. Section 3 should be experimental procedure. Please include a detailed experimental procedure in section 3. Add some figures also. Without this it is difficult to validate the results.
3. Include an economic analysis of the generation of electric current.
4. Whether commercialization is possible? Explain.
5. Include the various parts on MFC in Figure 1.
6. What are the limitations of your research? What are the difficulties during the experimentation? What are the future scope of this work? Include in the conclusion section.
Author Response
Dear colleague, thank you very much for your comments.
All researchers have made the changes and have responded to each comment.
- A careful language editing is required.
Ans. It was corrected
2. Section 3 should be experimental procedure. Please include a detailed experimental procedure in section 3. Add some figures also. Without this it is difficult to validate the results.
Ans. The detailed experimental part is found in part 2, where it is how the waste was collected with quantities, and what was the procedure to follow; until exactly how much was used as fuel in microbial fuel cells.
3. Include an economic analysis of the generation of electric current.
Ans. As it is not yet scalable to large amounts of organic waste and the electricity production is very low; such analysis cannot be performed. Therefore, in this research, the electrical parameters are being reported without chemical additions or modifications of variables. But for a subsequent job it will be modified to increase the electrical values and thus be able to compare with standard prices of electrical current.
4. Whether commercialization is possible? Explain.
Ans. Currently not yet, because scaling to larger prototypes would be very expensive; For this reason, knowing, for example, the optimum operating pH is essential for the operations of these cells. Hopefully in the near future, yes.
5. Include the various parts on MFC in Figure 1.
Ans. The suggested was done
6. What are the limitations of your research? What are the difficulties during the experimentation? What are the future scope of this work? Include in the conclusion section.
Ans. The main limitations of this research dealt with the scarcity of available electrochemical equipment, which due to the pandemic, many have broken down due to lack of maintenance. Added a paragraph at the end of the conclusions about recommendations for future research and limitations.
best regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The work studies the potential of electric curent generation from mandarin waste via MFCs. In general, the manuscript is well written, eventhough only small portion of results were presented. Please kindly consider the following comments that may helpful for the improvement of the manuscript.
1. Please write down the current disposal method for waste fruits in developed and developing countries
2. Kindly revise the unit from Kg to kg
3. About 57 references have been cited, however, there are still lack of literature review in the Introduction. Especially the current application of MFCs for electrical generation. Please highlight the gap between previous research that has been published and this work. Therefore, the research questions can be clearly defined.
4. The independent and dependent should be presented clearly. Seems the author did only a set of experiment with one independent variable?
5. How about the repetition of the experiment? Duplicates or triplicates?
6. Please compare the current results with the literatures. It is suggested to present the performance of MFCs (e.g., typical voltage and electrical current) obtained in this study with the literature that used different kind of organic wastes.
7. The single and mixture of wastes may result in different characteristic of MFCs performances
8. What is the effect of bacteria / yeast portion?
9. What are the limitations of this research? please provide recommendation for future research in the conclusion.
Author Response
Dear colleague, thank you very much for your comments.
All researchers have made the changes and have responded to each comment.
- Please write down the current disposal method for waste fruits in developed and developing countries
Ans. The suggestion was made in the last lines of the first paragraph.
2. Kindly revise the unit from Kg to kg
Ans. Ok the changes were made
3. About 57 references have been cited, however, there are still lack of literature review in the Introduction. Especially the current application of MFCs for electrical generation. Please highlight the gap between previous research that has been published and this work. Therefore, the research questions can be clearly defined.
Ans. A few lines were added to the penultimate paragraph, to comment on what was suggested. As well as the first lines of the last paragraph have been restructured for a better understanding.
4. The independent and dependent should be presented clearly. Seems the author did only a set of experiment with one independent variable?
Ans. Yes, on this occasion only a single independent variable was used in order to see the generation of bioelectricity and the ignorance of the optimal pH for the operation of the MFCs with that substrate. Now knowing the optimum operating pH, it is possible to work by adding chemical agents to improve performance. The first lines of the last paragraph have been changed for a better understanding.
5. How about the repetition of the experiment? Duplicates or triplicates?
Ans. In triplicate, the indication was made in line 146, final part of section 2.1.
6. Please compare the current results with the literatures. It is suggested to present the performance of MFCs (e.g., typical voltage and electrical current) obtained in this study with the literature that used different kind of organic wastes.
Ans. Table 2 was placed, with reviews of the literature using different types of substrates.
7. The single and mixture of wastes may result in different characteristic of MFCs performances
Ans. Yes sure Yes; but the group of researchers only chose this type of waste to see its potential on its own.
8. What is the effect of bacteria / yeast portion?
Ans. The role played by bacteria and fungi is due to the fact that when they metabolize the substrates they generate redox reactions necessary to generate artifice electrons for the generation of electrical energy .
9. What are the limitations of this research? please provide recommendation for future research in the conclusion.
Ans. The main limitations of this research dealt with the scarcity of available electrochemical equipment, which due to the pandemic, many have broken down due to lack of maintenance. A paragraph was added at the end of the conclusions about recommendations for future research.
best regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The quality of the paper is improved now. Congratulations.
Author Response
Dear colleague, thank you very much for accepting the manuscript.
Best regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The author has addressed the comments and suggestions from Editor and Reviewers. Thus, the manuscript can be accepted for publication.
Author Response
Dear colleague, thank you very much for accepting the manuscript.
Best regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
