Phytochemical Profiling, and Antioxidant Potentials of South African and Nigerian Loranthus micranthus Linn.: The African Mistletoe Exposé

REVIEWER 1 SUGGESTIONS

AUTHOR RESPONCE

LINE NUMBER

Extensive editing of English language and style required

Does the introduction provide sufficient background and include all relevant references? (x) Must be improved

The introduction has been improved and relevant references also included

L47, L56 – L65

Are all the cited references relevant to the research? (x) Must be improved

Has been improved and yes, all cited references are relevant to the study

Is the research design appropriate?

(x) Must be improved

The research designed has been improved

L382- 391, L397 – 403, L411 - 420

Are the methods adequately described? (x) Must be improved

Are the results clearly presented?

(x) Must be improved

Are the conclusions supported by the results? (x) Must be improved

The conclusions had been improved

L394 - 401

The reported work in this MS is lacking novelty, the qualitative determination of plant constituents was done using preliminary screening chemical tests. Standardization of both plant extracts should be carried out using LCMS

The aim of the study is not to standardize the plant extracts but to investigate of the Nigerian and the South species have the same phytochemical profiles using standard protocols

Table 1 (L130, L and Table 5 (L365)

A comparison of the metabolic profiles of both plant extracts should be carried out

We cannot depend mainly in these preliminary phytochemical screening tests because these tests may give positive results with other plant constituents. Therefore, metabolomics and LCMS evaluations are important to increase the value of the current work.

The study aim was not profiling the plants’ metabolome which requires LC-MS.

In addition to phytochemical profiling, the other objective of the study was to investigate the antioxidant potentials of SA and NG mistletoe extracts suing DPPH, H₂O₂ and Fe3+ to Fe2+ assays

Table 2 (L160,), Fig 2 (L171), Table 3 (L181), Figs 3 – 7, Table 4 (L275), section 4.4 – 4.5.

The MS is not well written, the results section seems to be a discussion section. They should be merged under on section results and discussion.

The instruction for authors prescribes the results and discussion section to be reported as sections 2 and 3 respectively. We have done so in the manuscript.

L66 and L252

What are the reported constituents from this plant? What are the reported biological activities and folk uses in both country? This should be carefully discussed.

Reported compounds from the plant, the folkloric uses and biological activities of the plant has been included

L285 - 296

Minor concerns

1- The plant genus and species names should be italicized through the whole MS.

Plant genus and species has been italicized throughout the document.

2- Line 8-12. Should be summarize, the abstract should be concise and more informative.

Line 8 -12 has been summarized with fewer phrases.

Line 8 - 11

3- Abstracts needs careful revision. The control results should be added.

Abstract has been revised and results for the control -gallic acid and BHT included.

L24 - 31

4- English needs careful revision. There are many typing and grammatical mistakes throughout the whole MS.

English language has been carefully revised

L1 - 519

5- Full names for all abbreviations should be added when they are first appeared.

Done

L14, 16, 19, 20, 28, 186 and 267

6- Plant family name should be added in the abstract and keywords.

Plant family name ‘Linn.’ has been added to the abstract and keywords

L 8, L9, 13 and L35

REVIEWER 2 SUGGESTIONS

AUTHOR RESPONCE

LINE NUMBER

I am not qualified to assess the quality of English in this paper

Thank you

Not applicable (NA)

Does the introduction provide sufficient background and include all relevant references? (x) Must be improved)

The introduction has been improved and relevant references also included

L47, L56 – L65

Are all the cited references relevant to the research? (x) Must be improved)

Yes, all references are relevant to the research Please search the reference list

L58, 59, 66, 70, 306, 437 to 517

Is the research design appropriate?

(x) Not applicable

NA

NA

Are the methods adequately described? (x) Yes

The methods have been improved adequately described

Are the results clearly presented? (x) Must be improved

The results have been improved

L181 – 182, L266 – 271, L277 - 278

Are the conclusions supported by the results? (x) Must be improved

The conclusions had been improved

L394 - 401

The introduction should be completed with more convenient references adapted to the different topics treated and make a state of the art about the already known knowledge on mistletoes.

Done

L48, 49, L57 – L66

The results section is globally ok even though it is necessary to make some statistical analysis before stating things on the comparisons. Need also in the figures and tables.

A p = 0.06 was calculated for Table 2

A p = 0.002 has been determined for Table 3

p-vales for the IC₅₀ values of the tree antioxidant assay methods has determined and discussed.

L158 – 159

L181 – 182

L266 - 271

The discussion section should be completed reviewed to make a real discussion on the results obtained and not doing a summary of the results again.

The discussion section has been improved.

L312 - 324

The material and methods section are globally ok.

Thank you

You could find more detailed comments in the document attached.

Detailed comments seen and attended to

REVIEWER 2 SUGGESTIONS 2

AUTHOR RESPONCE

LINE NUMBER

The introduction has been increased of quality with better convenient references. But the discussion is still lacking of references, and a real discussion of the results.

They are three references [29], [30] and [31] in the discussions

L278, l294, and L313

But my main problem concerns the figures in the results section, I'm worried about the fact that standard deviation you say you have calculated never appear in the figures and considering the methods you used the level of precision can not be so high to give standard errors which are hidden by the dots all the time. So I cannot evaluate the "significance" of the results you are proposing.

If the results were presented in a tabular form, then standard deviations would have been included.

Standard deviations cant be represented in a figure(s).

Indication of error bars does not feature in all graphs.

In addition you have other minor remarks in the file attached

Present

Corrected to presence

Table 4: But the signs are not in the Table

-, +, ++, +++ legend has been removed from Table 4

L89

P

Corrected to p

L111

P

Corrected to p

L112

P

Corrected to p

L113

Tannins

Corrected to tannins

L117

Figure 1, indicate in the figure the number of plates

Numbers 1 – 4 added to the plates

L151

366nm, add space

Space added

L152

has

Changed to had

L156

Indicate number also in photo

Numbers indicated

L173

was

Changed to were

L189

Figure 3, unit missing

Unit (nm) added

Figure

NGDCM The legend should be explicit

Anywhere I can see standard deviation

Meaning of NGDCM was given

Standard cant be shown on a Figure but in a table

L20

Figure 3 and not a Table

Unit missing on Figure

Unit are affixed on all figures

Figures 3 - 8

0,2

Change to 0.2

L220

Figure 4; is really extrange that we cannot see the error bars in any point in any figure.

Error bars are not mandatory to all graphs

L210 and L211

use

Changed to used

L235

South African and Nigerian DCM…Add acronym

SADCM and NGDCM added

L252

Repeated information

Deleted

L310

Asl??

Asl has been deleted

L62

=0.002

Corrected p = 0.002, 180 typo also removed

L179

Strike through

Deleted

L281

Strike through

Deleted

L382

- Was present

Deleted

L350

In particular, mistletoe is in the

Corrected to Mistletoe is used in the traditional management

290

Standards protocols

Corrected to standard protocols

L344

… in the mat & method section a number is missing.

Missing number not detected

Not applicable