Application of the Molecular Interaction Volume Model for Calculating Activities of Elements in Ferromanganese Alloys: Mn-C, Mn-Fe, Fe-C, and Mn-Fe-C Systems

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors applied the molecular interaction volume model (MIVM) for calculating activities of elements in Mn-C, Mn-Fe, Fe-C, and Mn-Fe-C systems. 

Fig. 6 : Explain why calculated values are apart from experimental data.

Author Response

Dear Editors and Reviewers:

Thank you for your letter and for the reviews’ comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Application of the Molecular Interaction Volume Model for Calculating Activities of Elements in Ferromanganese Alloys: Mn-C, Mn-Fe, Fe-C and Mn-Fe-C Systems” (Manuscript ID: crytals-1677826). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance for our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. We have polished this paper. Revised portion are marked in red in this paper. The main corrections in this manuscript and the respond to the reviewer’s comments are as following:

Reviewer #1:

1. Fig. 6: Explain why calculated values are apart from experimental data.

Respond: Thanks to the reviewer for valuable comments. According to the reviewer's comments, we checked the manuscript carefully. There are certain errors between our experimental results and previous research results, all of which are within their range. In other words, the obtained results are acceptable. At the same time, Young et al. (Young et al.ISIJ international, 2003, 43(2): 144-152.) utilized the lattice site ratio model developed by Chipman (Chipman Metallurgical transactions 1(1970) 2163-2168.) to describe the activity of C in Mn-Fe-C ternary alloys, it showed a negative deviation from ideal behavior at 1563K to 1773K.;Li et al. (Li Metallurgical and Materials Transactions B 28(1997) 553-562.) calculated activity of C in Mn-Fe-C systems by UIPF which showed a positive or negative deviation due to the big difference of interaction parameters between Mn-based and Fe-based systems;Ni et al. (Ni et al. Steel Research 61(1990) 113-116) calculated activity of carbon in Mn-Fe-C melt by the same activity method and Wagner’s formula, which showed negative deviation at C saturation (a_C ~1). There are also errors in the studies of the above scholars, but our experimental data also have deviations, but this deviation is relatively small in general. Thank the reviewers for their rigorous attitude and hope that our answers will be approved by the reviewers.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Review of the manuscript "Application of the Molecular Interaction Volume Model for Calculating Activities of Elements in Ferromanganese Alloys: Mn-C, Mn-Fe, Fe-C and Mn-Fe-C Systems". It is about the molecular interaction volume model derived from statistical thermodynamics and fluid phase equilibria.

The manuscript appears clear, almost well organized. English acceptable.

It can be reconsidered for publication after the following major revisions:

Line 39: [3-16]. 13 citations, one shot. Unacceptable. Please split and motivate each of them.

Fig. 1: increase axis readability.

Line 50: [21-27]: Please split and motivate each of them.

Ref. 37 and 39 are not called in the main text.

Line 369: by, not be.

References are not in compliance with the journal requirements. Please follow author's instructions.

Author Response

Dear Editors and Reviewers:

Thank you for your letter and for the reviews’ comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Application of the Molecular Interaction Volume Model for Calculating Activities of Elements in Ferromanganese Alloys: Mn-C, Mn-Fe, Fe-C and Mn-Fe-C Systems” (Manuscript ID: crytals-1677826). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance for our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. We have polished this paper. Revised portion are marked in red in this paper. The main corrections in this manuscript and the respond to the reviewer’s comments are as following:

Reviewer #2:

1. Line 39: [3-16]. 13 citations, one shot. Unacceptable. Please split and motivate each of them.

Respond: Thank you for your valuable suggestions and opinions. According to the reviewer's suggestion, we are very sorry to have the reviewers misunderstood the form of presentation in our writing. We presented the common points of multiple references in one sentence. We have rearranged the literature in the manuscript, described the literature separately, and marked the cited literature in blue in the manuscript. Thank the reviewers for their serious attitude.

2. Fig. 1: increase axis readability.

Respond: Thank you for your valuable suggestions and opinions. According to the reviewer's suggestion, we carefully examined Figure 1 in the manuscript and replaced the clearer figure. The purpose of drawing Figure 1 is to intuitively show that the solution for the interaction coefficients of B_MnC and B_CMn does not depend on the choices of initializing values in the optimization process, the error (B_MnC and B_CMn) was plotted in 3D. The same method is also shown in Reference (Poizeau S, et al. Journal of the American Chemical Society 135(2013) 8260-8265.). As seen in Figure 1 on the representative case of B_MnC and B_CMn, there is only one minimum in this function, and coordinates of this error value are calculated to this minimum found by the numerical solver of MATLAB. It is hoped that our answers can be approved by reviewers.

Figure 1. Representative case of error as a function of the B_MnC and B_CMn in the case of Mn-C liquid alloy at 1772K (Minimum obtain for B_MnC =1.780 and B_CMn =1.343).

3. Line 50: [21-27]: Please split and motivate each of them

Respond: Thank you for your valuable suggestions and opinions. According to the reviewer's suggestion, we have adjusted the manuscript. We apologize for our negligence in writing which misleads the reviewers. In the manuscript, we want to summarize through a summary statement, so some references are listed. In the following narration, the references involved have been separately elaborated, and the references are marked in blue.

4. Ref. 37 and 39 are not called in the main text

Respond: Thank you for your valuable suggestions and opinions. According to the reviewer's suggestion, we carefully reviewed the manuscript. We have deleted these two references, rearranged the references, and eliminated the references that were not mentioned. Thank the reviewers for their serious work, pointing out our mistakes.

5. Line 369: by, not be.

Respond: Thank you for your valuable suggestions and opinions. According to the reviewer's suggestion, we have revised the manuscript and marked the errors in red.

6. References are not in compliance with the journal requirements. Please follow author's instructions.

Respond: Reviewer’ comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper. We are sincere in our best to implement your suggestions. We have readjusted the references according to the journal requirements and thanked the reviewers for their rigorous review attitude.

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Accept in present form