Antibacterial Activity and Kinetic Release of Laureliopsis philippiana (Looser) Essential Oil from Nanostructured Porous Silicon with Surface-Functionalization Alternatives

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The topic is interesting and worth of publication. Revision is needed before publication.

- Cumulative release show an up and down profile. Please explain, being a cumulative release it should never go down by definition.

- There must be a mistake in the evaluation of R^2. It cannot be negative!

- BET method could be helpful for the material characterization.

- Introduction is weak. Please improve it with recent relevant work in the domain. See for instance:

Plants 2019, 8(9), 300; https://doi.org/10.3390/plants8090300 

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(13), 6759; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12136759

Appl. Sci. 2022, 12(12), 5800; https://doi.org/10.3390/app12125800 

Carbohydrate Polymers 2016, 152, 548–557, doi:10.1016/j.carbpol.2016.07.041.

Author Response

Response to reviewers is attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

1. How the possible generation of hazardous compounds (line 62) during water and light exposure of the tested essential oil affects the possibility of its usage in the medical sector?

2. The advantage of using porous nanomaterials to prevent oil evaporation should be explained in more detail (see lines 63-64). Some examples of possible applications of such materials should be given.

3. The novelty of this research should be clearly stated in the introduction. Are there any similar delivery systems already tested /any other carrier/? Describe them.

Particular comments:

4. Lines 24-26: sentence unclear

5. Line 29 "would generate an improvement in the kinetic release of the Laureliopsis philippiana" – an improvement in relation to what other kind/type of release or material?

6. Line 35 what does "medicinal properties" mean – this is an inappropriate statement

7. Line 56: "specie"

8. Line 58: I couldn't find the results of antibacterial actin on E.Coli and Enterobacter in the indicated reference [10,11]

9. Figure 4: some bands in the FTIR spectra are non-visible – please enlarge the Y axis, also add the FTIR spectra of neat nPSI as a reference

10. Line 345: change "stable release" into "constant cumulative release"

11. Line 346: "reached a maximum at time .."

12. Lines 346-348: please check the values (for example, in Figure 4C the maximum release corresponds to 4h, not 0.5. Or clearly indicate if you discuss the value of cumulative release or the release rate

13. Table 2: check all data carefully. Is it possible that the R(square) value is negative? Is it really the determination factor (R2) or rather the correlation factor (R).

14. In the discussion of the possible interactions between oil and the release carrier (modified nPSI) refer to the chemical structure of the main component of the oil given in Table 1. 

Author Response

The point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments is attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

This is a well-written manuscript that lacks some important discussion regarding the major interactions between the essential oils and the oxidized silicon wafer. For improving this discussion the authors should provide an additional figure with the chemical structures of the four main essential oils in the composition and hypothesize how the interaction with the oxidized silicon would be. Other suggestions are below.

Line 2: the title requires shortening; maybe elimination of "...and Evaluation of the... "

Abstract: Quote major mode of achieving functionalization (covalent binding? adsorption?) Quote mechanisms of controlled release achieved by functionalization.

Line 215: Define RT in the table caption.

Line 268: Define contents for the two insets; improve readability for the x-axis in the top inset

Line 273: Replace "parameter"by "parameters"

Lines 278-279: Rephrase and clarify how undecylenic acid increases stability against dissolution.

Lines 420-424: Fill in the blanks the contents for contributions, funding, etc

Author Response

The point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments is attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments addressed 

Author Response

Thanks for your review; we have corrected the Figure 2 and the figure caption. 
The corrected version of our manuscript is attached.

Best regards.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx