Biocompounds from Green Algae of Romanian Black Sea Coast as Potential Nutraceuticals
, Rodica Sirbu 3,*, Ana-Maria Laura Dragan 3,†, Bogdan-Stefan Negreanu-Pirjol 1,*, Elena Roxana Axente 4 and Ana-Maria Ionescu 5,6Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The present work characterizes the nutritional and functional potential of different macroalgae from the Black Sea.
Overall the methods and experimental design are clear and adequate however I would reccomend however:
- a secondary scale in figures 5 and 9
- information regarding statistical significance of diferences reported
The paper would benefit from context regarding its innovative potential: are any differences between these samples and literature for the same species and why?
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for the your comments and suggestions.
Please find the responses in the attached document.
Best regards!
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Recent research illustrates the potential of seaweeds in the nutraceutical trade. It has been demonstrated that they are a plentiful source of unique and varied biocompounds. The seaweed powder was used to make ether, alcohol, and water extracts all at once. All three seaweeds were subjected to biochemical evaluation to ascertain their contents for moisture, ash, sulphate, lipids, protein, carbohydrate, oligosaccharides, and polysaccharides, as well as dietary fiber. The vitamins A, E, C, B1, B2, B3, and B6 as well as minerals were specifically identified and examined. Pigments, antioxidant activity, and antibacterial activity were also determined. The work is important, with a thorough examination of all three seaweeds collected from the Romanian Black Sea shore. Nevertheless, the potential of these three seaweeds—Ulva lactuca, Enteromorpha intestinalis, and Cladophora vagabunda—to create a variety of biocompounds from various sources is already well established. The entire study employed crude extract, but recently, the nutraceutical sector has focused on isolating individual bio components. As a result, there is a novelty issue with this manuscript. Novelty of the work needs to be presented clearly in the manuscript. Few more corrections are given below for the betterment of the manuscript.
Line 91 Its October not Octomber
Line 92 What exactly does a representative medium suggest?
Line 102 What is the powder storage temperature set ?
Line 107 Remove “and “
Line 112 Mention the “ACW” abbreviation?
Line 122 What does “Desind” means?
Improve resolution of Figure 2 Its blur
Line 133 From plant do you mean seaweed. Both are very different
In section 2.5 provide equations derived from standard curve
What are the standards used for identification of carotenoids in HPLC?
Line 203 Why Msample is 0.5g ?
Line 207 Mention AOAC abbreviation?
Line 209 Provide detail of Beta carotene standard used line catalog no., Company, Purified %?
Mention x,y in equation 2,3 and 5
Line 281 Its not ‘hidroalcoholic ’ its hydroalcoholic
Line 275-278 Provide complete names
Line 326,334 Either mention oligosaccharides or MAO. Why using “oligosaccharides (MAO)” ?
Line 365 Instead of writing and b, write Chlorophyll b.
In section 3.6.2 Provide some pictures of well plates used to calculate inhibition zone?
Line 503 Italics are not used for "and the lowest for"
The conclusion section has to be enhanced because it is very general. At least, indicate the best sources of seaweed among the three based on your suggestions, along with reasons and specific values.
Improve the image quality of all the images and image illustrating the flowcharts.
Grammar and usage mistakes should be fixed across the whole article.
In order to make the manuscript more interesting, attempt to improvise with alternative plots or tables as there are too many bar graphs that are identical to one another.
Grammar and usage mistakes should be fixed across the whole article. English Language editing is required.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for the your comments and suggestions.
Please find the responses in the attached document.
Best regards!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript analyzed the biochemical composition, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activity of green algae coming from the Romanian Black Sea Coast. The results are supported by sufficient methodology and the experiments are adequately performed. I would recommend the publication of the manuscript after some formatting changes. The remarks are provided as follows:
1) Line 88 change “analysess” to “s analyses”
2) Line 91: change “Octomber” to “October”
3) Line 122: change “desind process” to “design process”
4) Figure 4, put the scale of the y-axis to 100%,
5) Line 357. Check the text formatting
6) In some figures the title and unit of the y-axis are missing, add them
7) Line 514. Remove the double dot in “Figure 5..”
8) Line 522: put dot after “(0.69±0.03 mg/100g d.w.)”
9) line 531. Remove the space between “172 and “90.35” (17 90.35 ± 2.55 mg/kg d.w.)”
10) line 536: put the lowercase letter for“Content”
The manuscript is well-written and easy to understand, but it needs editing for some typos
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for the your comments and suggestions.
Please find the responses in the attached document.
Best regards!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
The proposed work aims to a complete characterization of marine algae from the Romanian Black Sea coasts, in order to analyze the possible applications as nutraceuticals or similar.
In detail, three different species have been investigated: Ulva lactuca, Enteromorpha intestinalis and Cladophora vagabunda which reveal a very similar compositions in terms of lipids, carbohydrates, vitamins and ashes.
However, the composition obtained should be compared with the data present in the literature from other marine algae from other territories, in order to improve this study.
It would be sufficient to insert at least one table in the terminal part of the test with discussion of the results obtained, in order to support this argument.
In addition, the following revisions are proposed for a possible publication:
- The abstract should be rewritten by highlighting the most important research topics. For example, "Green algae exist in almost every sea and ocean of the world, however, there is currently 23 little research regarding marine algae....." can be omitted
- Keywords are not appropriate, they should be single or double words
- Graphical abstract and highlights absent
- Resolution of Figures should be improved
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for the your comments and suggestions.
Please find the responses in the attached document.
Best regards!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The queries are adequately answered and the authors worked well on the improvemnet of the manuscript.
Reviewer 4 Report
The authors have exaustively responded to reviews questione therefore the pubblication on this journal Is reconmended
