Dynamics of Planktonic Microbial Community Associated with Saccharina japonica Seedling
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The reviewed article dealt with investigation of changing in microbial communities accompany with Saccharina japonica growing in tanks with seedling collectors. It was shown at the high methodical level that planktonic microbial communities change over time within tanks during kelp seedling production.
There are some misprints in the text. For example, at line 279 instead of asα-Proteobacteria must be as α-Proteobacteria, at line 388 еhe title “Supplementary Materials:” and subsequent text should be separated by a paragraph indent.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 1 Comments
Point 1:
The reviewed article dealt with investigation of changing in microbial communities accompany with Saccharina japonica growing in tanks with seedling collectors. It was shown at the high methodical level that planktonic microbial communities change over time within tanks during kelp seedling production.
There are some misprints in the text. For example, at line 279 instead of asα-Proteobacteria must be as α-Proteobacteria, at line 388 the title “Supplementary Materials:” and subsequent text should be separated by a paragraph indent.
Response 1:
Thank you for your careful review. We are sorry that here are still some minor mistakes in the manuscript. According to your suggestions, we have made the following revisions on this manuscript:
(1) A space has been added between “as” and “α-Proteobacteria” to correct the writing error at line 279.
(2) The “Supplementary Materials and subsequent text” was separated from the Conclusion to be a separate paragraph at line 392.
We also found some misprints and revised as follows:
(1) “NO3-” at line 27, 29 have been changed to “NO3-”.
(2) “medical and chemical industries” at line 43 has been changed to “medical, and chemical industries”.
(3) “ºC” at line 109 and 312 have been changed to “°C”.
(4) The sentence at line 178 to 180 was modified to “The nodes in the reconstructed network represent the ASVs, whereas the edges correspond to strong (|r| > 0.8) and significant (FDR-adjusted p < 0.01) Spearman's correlations between nodes. ”
(5) “30.3% and 14.7%” at line 234 has been changed to “30.3%, and 14.7%”.
(6) “15.1% and 34.0%” at line 235 has been changed to “15.1%, and 34.0%”.
(7) “bacterial communities” at line 274 has been changed to “microbial communities”.
(8) “γ-Proteobacteria and Bacteroidia” at line 279 and 280 have been changed to “γ-Proteobacteria, and Bacteroidia”.
(9) “patterns” at line 382 has been changed to “pattern”.
(10) “networks” at line 399 and in Table S5 of Supplementary Materials have been changed to “network”.
(11) The contents of “Phylum/class” in Table S5 was changed from italic to non-italic.
(12) The contents of “Total” in Table S6 was changed from italic to non-italic.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Please go over the manuscript one more time to check anymore typological errors which I have pointed out in my previous review. For example Line 254 - Porteobacterial should read as Proteobacterial
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 2 Comments
Point 1:
Please go over the manuscript one more time to check anymore typological errors which I have pointed out in my previous review. For example Line 254 - Porteobacterial should read as Proteobacterial.
Response 1:
We are sorry that there are still some minor errors in the manuscript. Thank you for pointing out the typological errors. We have reviewed the manuscript again According to your suggestions.
(1) “Porteobacterial” at line 255 has been changed to “Proteobacterial”.
We also found some misprints and revised as follows:
(1) “NO3-” at line 27, 29 have been changed to “NO3-”.
(2) “medical and chemical industries” at line 43 has been changed to “medical, and chemical industries”.
(3) “ºC” at line 109 and 312 have been changed to “°C”.
(4) The sentence at line 178 to 180 was modified to “The nodes in the reconstructed network represent the ASVs, whereas the edges correspond to strong (|r| > 0.8) and significant (FDR-adjusted p < 0.01) Spearman's correlations between nodes. ”
(5) “30.3% and 14.7%” at line 234 has been changed to “30.3%, and 14.7%”.
(6) “15.1% and 34.0%” at line 235 has been changed to “15.1%, and 34.0%”.
(7) “bacterial communities” at line 274 has been changed to “microbial communities”.
(8) “γ-Proteobacteria and Bacteroidia” at line 279 and 280 have been changed to “γ-Proteobacteria, and Bacteroidia”.
(9) “patterns” at line 382 has been changed to “pattern”.
(10) “networks” at line 399 and in Table S5 of Supplementary Materials have been changed to “network”.
(11) The contents of “Phylum/class” in Table S5 was changed from italic to non-italic.
(12) The contents of “Total” in Table S6 was changed from italic to non-italic.
The contents of “Total” in Table S6 was changed from italic to non-italic.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
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.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The reviewed article dealt with investigation of changing in microbial communities accompany with Saccharina japonica growing in tanks with seedling collectors. It was shown at the high methodical level that planktonic microbial communities change over time within tanks during kelp seedling production.
There are some misprints in the text. For example, at line 275 printed “α-Proteobactreria” instead of “α-Proteobacteria”.
The paper can be accepted in present form.
Reviewer 2 Report
This study that rarely tackles bacterial dynamics in a cultured seaweed such as the sugar kelp Saccharina, is well written except for minor typos that need correction (see below). However, I found one relevant issue that the author may want to address as to why this important aspect in microbial ecology was not considered in the first place, to wit:
- Seawater that was used in the culture of kelp Saccharina, beginning from hatchery, even if pre-filtered prior to its use as medium, always contain particulates that form during culture and bacteria do not always exist as free-living cells but take advantage as “hitchhikers” to these particulates as their convenient source of nutrients. Please account this aspect in your paper how bacteria as free-living or as particulate-attached forms would make a difference in their interaction with the cultured seaweed.
A few minor typos and improvement to be made on certain figures:
- Check corrections in the manuscript
- Figure 1, Y axis label should read as “Observed bacterial/archaeal species”
- Figure 3b: “Abundance” should read as “Relative Abundance”; please indicate, if possible, if this number can have an equivalent estimated number in terms of no. of cells per mL.
- Increase font size in Figs. 4b and 5 to be readable.
