Meta-Analysis of Genetic Factors for Potato Starch Phosphorylation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In this study we quantified phosphorus content in potato tuber starch harvested in 2017, 2018, and 2019 and utilized it for genome wide associations study (GWAS) in order to reveal genetic factors underlying the trait. GWAS based on general linear model (GLM) with principal component analysis (PCA) was performed.

Thematically the work is interesting for the researchers and professionals and the proposed manuscript is relevant to the scope of the journal. Please correct some text in meta analysis section, it is too similar to text in the Introduction section.

I found it appropriate for publication in the Agronomy journal, but only after some modifications and clarification from the Authors.

The title is a clear representation of the manuscript's content.

The overall organization and structure of the manuscript are appropriate. The paper is well written and the topic is appropriate for the journal.
The aim of the paper is well described and the discussion was well approached, its results and discussion are correlated to the cited literature data.

The literature review is comprehensive and properly done.

The novelty of the work must be more clearly demonstrated.

The significance of the Work: Given the large number of analyzed data, this is an interesting study with a possible significant impact in this area.
Statistical interpretation of the analytical data must be more properly presented. Perhaps a better explanation of the performed statistical tools should be explained, rather than mentioning the used software packages. Generally speaking, all plots are hard to read, even harder to understand! The samples are sometimes named by names and sometimes by numericals?

The significance of the correlation coefficients could be calculated (Table 2)? Moreover, please check if all correlation coefficients in Table 4 were really significant at level p<0.05? 

Other Specific Comments: The work is properly presented in terms of the language. The work presented here is very interesting and well done, it is presented in a compact manner.
The methodology applied in the research is presented in clear manner, so that it is repeatable by other authors.
The manuscript should be improved from technical/graphical viewpoint (especialy Fig 1 and Fig 3). 

Author Response

Dear Colleague,

Thank you for reviewing our manuscript. We took into account all your suggestions and improved the paper correspondingly. All the corrections are summarized in the table below. Hope, we made it more clear and logical.

Thank you again!

 

№	Reviewer	Corrections
1	Please correct some text in meta analysis section, it is too similar to text in the Introduction section.	Corrected. Similar phrase removed, reference changed.
2	The novelty of the work must be more clearly demonstrated.	Done.
3	Statistical interpretation of the analytical data must be more properly presented. Perhaps a better explanation of the performed statistical tools should be explained, rather than mentioning the used software packages. Generally speaking, all plots are hard to read, even harder to understand!	Corrected. Some explanations are added in lines 96-116 for statistical methods explanation. Also, reference for practice with STRUCTURE package added (ref [10]). Some changes in plots done. Figures and Discussion is changed to make overall discussion more logical.
4	The samples are sometimes named by names and sometimes by numericals?	Corrected. All samples on plots named by numbers. Samples’ names and numbers may be found in Supplementary.
5	The significance of the correlation coefficients could be calculated (Table 2)?	Done.
6	Moreover, please check if all correlation coefficients in Table 4 were really significant at level p<0.05?	Checked.
7	The manuscript should be improved from technical/graphical viewpoint (especialy Fig 1 and Fig 3).	Fig 1 - 6 corrected.

 

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

This manuscript entitled  "Meta-analysis of genetic factors for potato starch phosphorylation"is good

This may be interesting, but some important points need to be resolved. Importantly, a study must provide a critical analysis of the data. In other words, you must assess whether specific data published really stand up to scientific scrutiny. In order to achieve the above, you must clearly define your specific aims and objectives. So in your study you must develop a critical appraisal of the state of the art. This is an essential element of any article. There are important scientific questions (both conceptual and methodological) which need to be addressed with the primary studies. A study must highlight this. The introduction, which is written in clear language, covers a number of relevant issues. Information are noteworthy, and not are correct supported by similar results from the specialty. Try to rewrite the abstract and conclusions, I also recommend the nuance of the introduction, that is tedious and unsustainable.

Author Response

Dear Colleague,

Thank you for reviewing our manuscript. We took into account all your suggestions and improved the paper correspondingly.Namely, we did some changes in Abstract, added focused aim and objectives paragraph in Introduction, changed an order of figures and discussions in the text to make the following of the manuscript's logic more smooth.

Hope, we made it more clear and logical, clearly defined aims and objectives.

Thank you again!

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

This manuscript entitled  "Meta-analysis of genetic factors for potato starch phosphorylation" is good for publication in Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395).

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.