Analytical and Numerical Models for TE-Wave Absorption in a Graded-Index GNP-Treated Cell Substrate Inserted in a Waveguide
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The authors provided the analytical formulae to selectively calculate the absorption in certain region (mimics cancer cell loaded with GNP for the sake of treatment) in a lossy background (mimicking the surrounding healthy cells), and they validated their formulae in accordance with a commercial finite element which shows excellent agreement.
The graded index profile that authors chose and will be vastly different in real scenario makes me confused about the novelty in this work compared to their previous results in [14,15,18]. In fact, the new analytical formula in Eq. (14) and in Eq. (17) is a natural outcome of the derivation in [14,15,18]. Additionally, some of the current figures are very similar to the figures in [18]. Apart from the novelty which must be emphasized I have more additional comments and questions:
1.Given the scattering parameters and the background permittivity and assuming the graded index medium profile with known length is considered, can we calculate the absorption in that layer using the analytical formulae?
2.The authors should clearly state what is the meaning of reflection and transmission of certain layer? I think absorption in certain layer is easy to understand, but what is meant by reflection and transmission from the same layer, does it take into account the round-trip reflection from the adjacent layers?
3.Why solving for E filed in Eq. (4), while it is easier to solve for H?
4.There are two scale factors, auxiliary Eq. (14), and relative Eq. (17) that contains m. In Fig. 5.b, the title is the relative scale factor, what is the value of m?
5.If I choose f=1.5GHz the relative scale factor is around 15, the reflection is around 0.05 and the transmission is around 0.03, if we calculate the (transmission + reflection) multiplied by the relative scale factor, we get, 15*0.08=1.2 what is the meaning of that number in passive systems?
6.Eq. (17) there should be no (-4 real(p)) in the power.
7.There should be an explicit relation for the absorption in the finite layer not the ratio between transmitted and reflected powers.
8.How is the speed of the analytical solution compared to COMSOL solution speed?
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The paper under revision is a well-organized and well-illustrated research paper and should be of interest for the scientific community. The Authors aim to study a numerical model using the COMSOL simulation software for the application in the thermal cancer therapy with gold nanoparticles. For this aim, the Authors studied absorption phenomena in a hollow waveguide with an inserted graded dielectric layer for the case of TE-wave propagation. Moreover, the study included two different examples with both non-dispersive and dispersive permittivities and the results show a good agreement with corresponding analytical results. Paragraphing is concise and good, and the article consists of an effective result. The paper is generally well written. I suggest a spell check to avoid minor typos. The quality of the paper can be enhanced increasing the number of references. For example, in the first part of the introduction, among others, I suggest to cite the following papers, in order to frame better the applicative purpose of the studied model:
Small, 2011,7, 2, 169–183. DOI: 10.1002/smll.201000134
- Bioconjug Chem., 2016, 1043-1802, 27 (12). DOI: 10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.6b00568
- Front. Chem. 2021. 9, 736519. DOI: 10.3389/fchem.2021.736519
I also suggest to rewrite the conclusion paragraph because it sounds very similar to the abstract.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
In the submitted manuscript, Svendsen et al. investigated the absorption phenomena in a hollow waveguide with an inserted graded dielectric layer for the case of TE-wave propagation in order to enable the possibility of using the gold nanoparticles heating treatment in the cancer therapy. In this work, the authors promoted previously developed analytical formulae to be readily applicable to calculating the absorption coefficient within the inserted loss layer only, quantifying the absorption in the AgNPs-fed cancer tissue. Additionally, new exact analytic scale factors that eliminate unessential absorption in the surrounding lossy medium were developed.
The reviewer suggests that this manuscript be accepted for publication after minor improvements, such as the introduction of full names for every abbreviation in the place where it the first time mentioned is.
e.g., page 1, line 2 – TE
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I would like to thank the authors for reviewing the comments.
