Variation in Spectral Characteristics of Dissolved Organic Matter and Its Relationship with Phytoplankton of Eutrophic Shallow Lakes in Spring and Summer

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

According to the title, the reviewed article discusses the spectral characteristics of dissolved organic matter and its relationship with phytoplankton. As the article deals with the eutrophic lake, it is an important issue for many lakes around the globe. The article was well planned and prepared, so it is worth publishing. Nevertheless, it requires some corrections and additions first.

Use the currently correct name Cyanobacteria in place of Cyanophyta.

When you refer to a work that has multiple authors in the text, the first name and et al. should be used. For example, in line 46 there is Carmen [9] found ... It should be Carmen et al. [9] found… In this case, however, this article should be cited: Daggett et al. [9] found .... as Carmen is a first name, not a surname.

In line 78 instead of Prymnesiacee it should be Prymnesiaceae.

In Figure 1, the Water inlet on the west side is marked. And what are these channels at the two southern edges of the lake? Are they also tributaries, or are they outflows?

Table 1 shows the spectrophotometric method for the determination of chlorophyll. Was extraction with acetone or ethyl alcohol used?

In line 180, there should be cyanobacterial bloom instead of algal bloom.

In Table 2 it is necessary to delete: Error! Reference source not found.

In line 211, instead of 8 families, there should be 8 phyla.

Line 220. Dominance refers to abundance, not the number of taxa. So here it can be written that these 3 phyla were represented by the greatest number of taxa.

Figure 4a is unnecessary because all this information is in the text. Instead, a graph of abundance (density) of all phyla is very much needed. Ideally, it should be a graph of the percentage share of each phylum in the total number of phytoplankton in the following months.

The abundance is given in units of n/L. Is it the number of individuals (specimens) or the number of cells per liter?

Lines 314 and 315. In Figure 7b, there are no species or genera, but phyla.

Lines 325 and 326. There it goes: "CODCr content was too high, organic matter will consume the dissolved oxygen and release nutrients ..." It's some kind of speculation. COD is an indicator of the amount of organic matter that is decomposed by strong oxidants like K2Cr2O7, in contrast to BOD, which is an indicator of organic matter that is decomposed by microorganisms. The oxygen in the lake is not consumed by organic matter, but by microorganisms.

Line 345. Instead of “by mixed-nutrient phytoplankton”, use “by mixotrophic phytoplankton”.

Line 346. Instead of “or degraded by phytoplankton through microbial action” use “or degraded by microbial decomposition”.

Line 393. Instead of “Carmen T D, Jasmine E S, Brenda M, Lafrancois, et al.” use “Daggett CT, Saros JS, Lafrancois BM, Simon KS, Amirbahman A”.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors, this article is very important in experimental field of evaluation for the dissolved organic compounds and you can improve some part of this article according to the comments below: 

1. Last statement from the abstract is very general and can be rewritten with some details related to provided research.

2. Introduction part must be finished with detailed novelty description, according to all references evaluated before.

3. Analytical methods will be more understandable for international audience, if there were added ISO standards and usual precision limits.

4. Table 2 is with error “260/488[31]Error! Reference source not found. “, maybe there are some mistakes in editing.

5. Conclusions can be improved with some details about scientific and practical added values of this conducted research.

Sincerely, Reviewer.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx