Nutritional and Structural Evaluation of Gluten-Free Flour Mixtures Incorporating Various Oilseed Cakes

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have investigated the addition of oil cakes to various gluten-free flour mixtures. They determined the mineral, amino acid, and fatty acid content in control samples that did not include the oil cakes and in four experimental samples with added oil cakes. Moreover, the structural characteristics were analyzed using X-ray fluorescence and electron microscopy. They found variations in the nutritional content while the amorphous structural properties stayed uncompromised with the crystallinity between 25-30%. This study indicated that the addition of oil seed cake flour can be considered an option to improve the nutritional value of gluten-free products without affecting the structure. The article may be potentially publishable, but it requires revisions.

 

 

-I suggest that the authors use official emails instead of Gmail addresses.

 

-The authors have not emphasized the novelty of their research.

 

-The iThenticate report shows a high similarity to the existing literature in the introduction section. Please rewrite the introduction section with more paraphrasing.

 

-Could the authors please elaborate on why maintaining the amorphous structure is crucial?

 

-In line 9, the authors stated: “This study focuses on the potential of flaxseed…”

Please change “the potential of flaxseed“ to “the potential of addition of flaxseed” or “the potential of incorporation of flaxseed”.

 

-The authors sometimes used “oil cake” and sometimes “oilcake” through the manuscript. Please correct all to “oil cake”.

 

-In line 84, please provide the reference for the claim that a fineness value of less than 500 microns could accelerate water absorption.

 

-In Sections 2.6-2.10. Please provide detailed information regarding the quantitative analysis methods in the supplementary material. Please include calibration curve data as well as limits of detection and standard deviations. If chromatography was used, please provide the chromatographic conditions and a chromatogram showing the separation. For mass spectrometry analysis, please provide the method details. It is not enough to only provide a reference.

 

-Table 2, I suggest that the authors report the limits of detection for each impurity and report “ < limit of detection value”,  instead of “not present”. Also, please include what pests were investigated in the “pest infestation” row.

 

-Table 3, as well as through the manuscript. Please use periods instead of commas for decimal places. For example, use 400.37 instead of 400,37.

 

-Table 4, Please consider the standard deviations and significant figures when reporting the values in the table. Also, limits of detection and errors need to be reported to verify the method was accurate to three decimal places.

 

-Table 5, please provide a footnote indicating the meaning of “-“. Does it mean not detected? As mentioned for other methods, please provide limits of detection for each fatty acid. Please provide the standard deviation for the values in the table.

 

-Table 6, please provide the units. Please make sure the reported values have the correct significant figures with regards to the reported standard deviation values.

 

In addition, when the authors mentioned “within the same column with different lowercase letters differing significantly among different samples of oilcakes”, do they mean a-d are standard deviation values? Please clarify.

 

-Line 319, please correct to “70-80 %” since the highest degree of crystallinity was reported as 30%.

 

-Table 7, please provide the units, and standard deviation.

 

-Figure 9, please increase the font size for axes numbers and titles.

 

-Please ensure that the provided DOI formats for all references are consistent.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Please find attached file  answers to your comments

Thanks

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript titled " Nutritional and structural evaluation of gluten-free flour mixtures incorporating various oilseed cakes" investigates the potential of flaxseed, soybean, sunflower, peanut, and pumpkin cakes in gluten-free flour formulations using rice flour, corn flour, and corn starch. The study reveals significant nutritional variations, with peanut cake having the highest omega-3 content and pumpkin cake excelling in magnesium and phosphorus. Flaxseed cake led in calcium, while soybean cake was richest in potassium, iron, and copper. X-ray fluorescence and electron microscopy confirmed the amorphous nature and fine particle size of the mixtures. Incorporating oilseed meal flour enhances nutritional value without compromising structural properties. The manuscript is recommended for publication after addressing my minor concerns.

Here are my minor concerns;

1.     Line 68, add more

2.     The author should add the graphical abstract

3.     There are too many jargon, please reduce it.

4.     The authors need to double-check the whole manuscript to remove grammatical errors/ typos/incomplete sentences and non-relative phrases.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Please find attached file  answers to your comments

Thanks

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Minor revision

1. References should be prepared following the requirements of the journal

[1.          Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C.D. Title of the article. Abbreviated Journal Name Year, Volume, page range.

2.          Author 1, A.; Author 2, B. Title of the chapter. In Book Title, 2nd ed.; Editor 1, A., Editor 2, B., Eds.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, 2007; Volume 3, pp. 154–196.

3.          Author 1, A.; Author 2, B. Book Title, 3rd ed.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, 2008; pp. 154–196.

4.          Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C. Title of Unpublished Work. Abbreviated Journal Name year, phrase indicating stage of publication (submitted; accepted; in press).

5.          Author 1, A.B. (University, City, State, Country); Author 2, C. (Institute, City, State, Country). Personal communication, 2012.

6.          Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C.D.; Author 3, E.F. Title of Presentation. In Proceedings of the Name of the Conference, Location of Conference, Country, Date of Conference (Day Month Year).

7.          Author 1, A.B. Title of Thesis. Level of Thesis, Degree-Granting University, Location of University, Date of Completion.)

8.          Title of Site. Available online: URL (accessed on Day Month Year).]

2. The aim of the study should be highlighted in the abstract.

3. The manuscript quality would be improved if the figures/tables were inserted into the main text close to their first citation. After that is the main text with the interpretation of the result, describing the respective figure/table. 

4. The captions of the figures should include a description of what they are containing.

5. The measuring units are missing in Table 6 and Table 7.

6. The caption of Figure 2 would be better if it is "X-ray fluorescence analysis of gluten-free mixture." (it is already known that this is a result).

7. It would be better if the caption of Figure 3 is "Gluten-free mixture (control sample)-electron microscopic image."  and a description of X40, X1000, X3000 should also be added in the caption. The same suggestion is valid for figures 4-8.

8. The name of the section "Results" should be corrected. If the section is named "Results", it should provide a concise and precise description of the experimental results, their interpretation and the experimental conclusions that can be drawn, without references. It could be "Results and Discussion" or section "Results" and section "Discussion".  

 

 

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Comments on the Quality of English Language

A minor spell check is required.

There are typographical and grammatical errors.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

Please find attached file  answers to your comments

Thanks

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have sufficiently addressed my comments.

However, I believe there was a misunderstanding regarding Table 2:

I suggested that instead of "not detected", the authors report based on their detection limit value. For example <1 ppm. However, the authors mentioned "<limit of detection value" instead of providing a number. Additionally, some rows still have "not present". 

I suggest that the authors keep their reporting consistent and report the values based on the detection limit that they have achieved for each compound. Reporting "<limit of detection" when detection limits were not reported might be confusing to the readers.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer

 

Table 2 is corrected

There are several methods to check for the presence of insect pests in the cake:
Visual inspection:
Check the grain for adult insects, larvae, spider webs or excrement.
Pay special attention to areas where grain clusters, such as folds, corners, and damaged grain.
Use a flashlight to get a better look at dark places.

Sifting:

Sift the grain through a fine-mesh sieve.
Pests and their larvae will sift through the sieve and the grain will remain on the sieve.