Predicting Short-Term Deformation in the Central Valley Using Machine Learning
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors use satellite imagery to analyze surface deformation problems. PCA and LSTM were used to perform surface deformation characterization and surface deformation prediction. The approach is applied to the city of Madera and shows better results than an averaging model.
Strength
The subject is important to remote sensing since land subsidence is a major adverse effect of excessive groundwater pumping.
Technically, the approach makes sense.
Weakness
The most important weakness of this paper is novelty. I can hardly find novel contributions to the approach. For example, it is common sense that LSTM is better than a simple averaging model.
The authors do not show the significance of their techniques against some state-of-the-art approaches in the literature.
This paper's theoretical nature is insufficient and trivial.
The paper is not well written and carefully checked before submission. For example, the authors should add a related work section to help readers to better understand the research problem and compare the current work with previous works. Also, the conclusion section is missing. And the result presentation needs to be improved. For example, the MSE results should be highlighted using tables or figures.
Author Response
Hello,
Thank you for the review. We have added a CNN model to compare the LSTM results to, and we have revised the Discussion section where we compare other papers' findings and highlight our paper's novelty aspects. We also highlighted the MSE results in a table as suggested, and added a separate Conclusion section. Minor grammatical errors were also fixed. Most of the revisions to the paper have been highlighted in red.
Thank you so much.
Reviewer 2 Report
I have reviewed the manuscript entitled "Predicting Short-Term Land Subsidence Deformation in the Central Valley using LSTM". In this paper the authors attempted a significant environmental issue that raising recent times. In this study, authors relying on satellite imagery to monitor and assess the extent of ground water sinking. Specifically, they used images from a satellite that emits microwaves which allows them to directly obtain the deformation at a specific time. Surely this is a relevant aspect. The study design is good and well structured. The methodology applied is novel for this study region. This study can be considered for publication in your esteemed journal. However, I have some observations that should be considered. So, I suggest for a major revision. If the authors rightly answer my queries, I will recommend it to accept. Following are some of the issues that I have observed during review process:
Major issues
1. How this study would be beneficial for society and policy making should be mentioned in the abstract.
2. I have not found any description of study area. I suggest authors to add a separate section on study area description and highlight how this study justified for this study region.
3. A methodological work flow chart is more suitable for understanding methodological approach easily. The authors should be considered the same.
4. In discussion section, the authors are mainly highlighted their study findings and outcomes. But, in discussion section the authors should incorporate other study findings and make a comparison their study with existing literature. The novelty of your study should also be highlighted here.
5. I have not found any conclusion section. The authors need to add conclusion section.
6. What is the recommendation you would like to provide to the society through this study? A different section on recommendation should also be added.
7. Have any limitations of your study from environmental and methodological point of view? I think this study mush have some limitations as this study used satellite data for analysis. The authors also need to add limitations section in the revised manuscript.
Minor issues
1. I suggest the authors not to use abbreviations in the title.
2. Keywords need to rewrite, most of the repeated in title and abstract
3. Line 27-28 need citation/s
4. Line 66-67 need citation/s
5. Line 126-129 need rephrase the sentences
6. Figure 6 and 7, there is no need to write the word latitude and longitude inside the figure
7. There are some grammatical errors throughout the manuscript, kindly check all with any native English person.
Thank you.
Author Response
Hello,
Thank you for the review and the improvements suggested. We have addressed all the minor issues you brought up. For the major issues, we added the benefit in the abstract, added a study area section, added a Discussion section that highlights the work's novelty as well as the limitations and recommendations, and a Conclusion section. Most of the revisions to the paper have been highlighted in red.
Thank you so much.
Reviewer 3 Report
I found that the given manuscript "Predicting Short-Term Land Subsidence Deformation in the Central Valley using LSTM" is interesting enough.
The first 3 sections are clearly described in the manuscript.
I have some concerns about the last section.
1. The authors have named it a Discussion but I could find the discussed material in this part. For me, it was like a part of the results and conclusions section.
2. I would recommend revising section 4. Authors should discuss the meaning of their results in the discussion part and separately conclusions section should be added.
Author Response
Hello,
Thank you for your review. We have revised the Discussion section where we discuss our findings and related works. We have also added a separate Conclusion section. Most of the changes have been highlighted in red.
Thank you so much.
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I thank the authors for the resubmission of their manuscript. Overall, the manuscript has improved in quality. I recommend a minor revision for the authors to better streamline their results and catch any lingering typos.
Author Response
Hello,
Thank you again for your review. We have went over the paper again and fixed some minor grammatical mistakes and sentence errors as well as rephrasing some sentences in the 'Results' section in order to improve clarity for the reader.
Thank you so much.
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors made sufficient changes as per my previous comments and suggestions.
However, I have found some minor sentences errors and grammatical mistakes which should be checked before publications.
Thank you.
Author Response
Hello,
Thank you again for your review. We have went over the paper again and made some fixes to minor grammatical mistakes and sentence errors as well as rephrasing some sentences to improve clarity.
Thank you so much.
