Enhancement of Hyphae Growth and Medium Optimization for Pleurotus eryngii-3 under Submerged Fermentation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Reading the abstract, title and bibliographic references of the article “Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation” developed by Changqing Liua, Jiajie Fengb, Simin Wanga, Yi Caoc and Yuxiang Shena, it presents a current topic, regarding the diversification of the mycelial biomasses production methods used for Pleurotus eryngii-3 mushroom, who presents numerous culinary and therapeutic properties.

The title of the article is informative and relevant.

By reading the abstract of the article, the reader gets a clear and faithful picture of the research carried out by the authors, being very comprehensive, containing essential introductory information, presenting the used working methods. However, the obtained results should be better exemplified and presented in the abstract.

Recommendation 1. Replacing the “seed” term with “mycelium” or “hypha”, because the “seed” term is not used in mushroom culture and can create various confusions.

The introduction clearly presents the topic addressed, the research ideas being clearly outlined, presenting in detail what is already known about this topic.

In the material and method chapter, the experience variables are properly defined and measured, the study methods are valid and reliable, there are enough details to repeat the study, and the topic of the article is clearly presented.

Recommendation 2. The presentation of culture environments in another form (for example in table) so that the presented information’s can be followed in a comparative way. In the presented form, the data is difficult to be follow.

The research results are presented in an inadequate way, the tables and graphs being presented only at the end of the article.

Recommendation 3. Graphs and tables must be interspersed in the text, so that the manuscript is easy to read and understand.

The conclusions are supported by the obtained results, but also by the bibliographic references, and respond to the intended purpose. However, the conclusions seem a bit long to me, they could be reformulated in a much more concise form.

Recommendation 4. Shorten the conclusions and present them in a much more succinct and easy-to-understand form.

The bibliographic references are relevant and recent, the authors making a correct reference generally including appropriate key studies, however, the 36 bibliographic sources seem to me to be few for the addressed topic, considering that for the studied species, after a simple search in Google Academic are returned 19,600 results, of which 7,400 from the last 5 years.

The article “Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation” presents an opportunity to inform future research, being a self-consistent article and responding to the proposed research objective.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Reviewer: 1

Reading the abstract, title and bibliographic references of the article “Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation” developed by Changqing Liua, Jiajie Fengb, Simin Wanga, Yi Caoc and Yuxiang Shena, it presents a current topic, regarding the diversification of the mycelial biomasses production methods used for Pleurotus eryngii-3 mushroom, who presents numerous culinary and therapeutic properties.

The title of the article is informative and relevant.

By reading the abstract of the article, the reader gets a clear and faithful picture of the research carried out by the authors, being very comprehensive, containing essential introductory information, presenting the used working methods. However, the obtained results should be better exemplified and presented in the abstract.

Recommendation 1. Replacing the “seed” term with “mycelium” or “hypha”, because the “seed” term is not used in mushroom culture and can create various confusions.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments. We had adopted the reviewer’s suggestion to use “hypha” instead of “seed” throughout the revised manuscript.

The introduction clearly presents the topic addressed, the research ideas being clearly outlined, presenting in detail what is already known about this topic.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments.

In the material and method chapter, the experience variables are properly defined and measured, the study methods are valid and reliable, there are enough details to repeat the study, and the topic of the article is clearly presented.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments.

Recommendation 2. The presentation of culture environments in another form (for example in table) so that the presented information’s can be followed in a comparative way. In the presented form, the data is difficult to be follow.

Response: We had done as reviewer’s suggestion. The components of nine different medium were displayed in table. And, the optimization of fermentation conditions was also presented in table, which could facilitate readers to understand the trial arrangement.

The research results are presented in an inadequate way, the tables and graphs being presented only at the end of the article.

Response: The tables and graphs had been adjusted the position and inserted into the corresponding content.

Recommendation 3. Graphs and tables must be interspersed in the text, so that the manuscript is easy to read and understand.

Response: We had done as suggestion in the revised manuscript.

The conclusions are supported by the obtained results, but also by the bibliographic references, and respond to the intended purpose. However, the conclusions seem a bit long to me, they could be reformulated in a much more concise form.

Response: The part of conclusions was shortened as “In this work, the authors hoped to develop a rapid breeding process for Pleurotus eryngii hypha for saving economic cost and time cost in the industrial production. The biomass and metabolic parameters of P. eryngii-3 were optimized by selection of culture medium, optimization of carbon and nitrogen source, optimization of culture condition and statistical method, in which the DCW of P. eryngii-3 was improved to 17.23 g/L. Meanwhile, the activity of laccase was also increased to 6.13 U/mL after optimization, in which the transcription levels of lcc genes were up-regulated and thus promoted the promotion of laccase activity. This work would provide the valuable experience and theoretical basis for production of Pleurotus eryngii hypha in industrial production.”

Recommendation 4. Shorten the conclusions and present them in a much more succinct and easy-to-understand form.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments. We had done as suggestion in the revised manuscript.

The bibliographic references are relevant and recent, the authors making a correct reference generally including appropriate key studies, however, the 36 bibliographic sources seem to me to be few for the addressed topic, considering that for the studied species, after a simple search in Google Academic are returned 19,600 results, of which 7,400 from the last 5 years.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments. We had added some related references in introduction for descripting the classification, application and fermentation optimization of Pleurotus eryngii. The revised parts were detailed presented in Introduction and References.

The article “Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation” presents an opportunity to inform future research, being a self-consistent article and responding to the proposed research objective.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors,

The manuscript entitled: Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation is related to the improvement of quality seed of P. eryngii-3. The quality of P. eryngii-3 was investigated in terms of the total DCW, total protein, polysaccharides, laccase activity, etc. Please check the abstract and the main text for spelling mistakes related to 'carbon' instead of 'carton'. I have also found a very strong simillarity to another article, in Line 329, so please check the article according to plagiarism. Pay also attention to literature and references you included. I would appreciate, if you could include more references from this field. The introduction could include adnotations, describing more detailed the fungus and its growth conditions, including the applications. My overall impression about your work is good, but the manuscript needs polishing. 

Author Response

Reviewer: 2

1. The manuscript entitled: Enhancement of hyphae growth and medium optimization by Pleurotus eryngii-3 under submerged fermentation is related to the improvement of quality seed of P. eryngii-3. The quality of P. eryngii-3 was investigated in terms of the total DCW, total protein, polysaccharides, laccase activity, etc. Please check the abstract and the main text for spelling mistakes related to 'carbon' instead of 'carton'.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comments. We had adopted the reviewer’s suggestion to use “carbon” instead of “carton” throughout the revised manuscript.

2. I have also found a very strong simillarity to another article, in Line 329, so please check the article according to plagiarism.

Response: The reviewer thinked that similar article might be “Cultivating Pleurotus ostreatus and Pleurotus eryngii mushroom strains on agro-industrial residues in solid-state fermentation. Part I: Screening for growth, endoglucanase, laccase and biomass production in the colonization phase”. This paper mainly studied the effect of culture substrates on the mycelial growth rates, biomass production and endoglucanase and laccase activities of P. ostreatus and P. eryngii during mycelial growth. However, we researched the selection of medium and carbon/nitrogen sources, and optimization of fermentation conditions and response surface method on hypha of P. eryngii-3. Meanwhile, the activity of laccase was improved observably, in which we found this was because of the up-regulation of Lcc genes. Therefore, our paper was original and different from the similar article.

3. Pay also attention to literature and references you included. I would appreciate, if you could include more references from this field. The introduction could include adnotations, describing more detailed the fungus and its growth conditions, including the applications. My overall impression about your work is good, but the manuscript needs polishing.

Response: Thanks for the reviewer’s comment. We had done as reviewer’s suggestion to add some related references in introduction for descripting the classification and application of Pleurotus eryngii. The references about fermentation optimization were replaced to the appropriate literatures by Pleurotus eryngii. The revised parts were detailed presented in Introduction and References.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx