Active Packaging Systems to Extend the Shelf Life of ‘Italia’ Table Grapes

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This authors proposed an active packaging system associated with an easy and affordable SO₂ pretreatment extended the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes. It is a promising technology for grapes because it controls gray mold, weight loss, and stem browning and maintains the color and firmness of berries. This technology has high application value for the preservation of Italia’ table grapes. TThe research background of this paper is explained clearly, the research method is designed reasonably, and the research data is detailed. I have two suggestions:

1. Does the proposed preservation method in this paper pose any safety risks to the consumption of grapes?  Is it necessary to determine the residual sulfur dioxide?

2. There are many ways to preserve grapes, including physical, chemical, and biological methods. How does the preservation effect of the method proposed in this paper compare with other methods? I suggest the author make a comparison in the discussion section.

Author Response

Response to Reviewers

Dear Reviewers, first of all, thank you very much for your comments and remarks. We tried to address all of them, and this new version of our manuscript was changed and improved according to your recommendations, as it can be checked below:

Reviewers’ comments: 

Reviewer#1:

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This authors proposed an active packaging system associated with an easy and affordable SO₂ pretreatment extended the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes. It is a promising technology for grapes because it controls gray mold, weight loss, and stem browning and maintains the color and firmness of berries. This technology has high application value for the preservation of Italia’ table grapes. TThe research background of this paper is explained clearly, the research method is designed reasonably, and the research data is detailed. I have two suggestions:

1. Does the proposed preservation method in this paper pose any safety risks to the consumption of grapes?  Is it necessary to determine the residual sulfur dioxide?

Ok, changes made. See L70-79.

2. There are many ways to preserve grapes, including physical, chemical, and biological methods. How does the preservation effect of the method proposed in this paper compare with other methods? I suggest the author make a comparison in the discussion section.

Ok, changes made. See L70-79.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript entitled "Active packaging systems to extend the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes" is well-structured and presents interesting results. In my opinion, the article can be published in Horticulturae once the authors address the following issue:

 Considering that the filamentous fungi inoculum count in the control is similar in both seasons (2019, 2020, according to Figure 5), please explain why treatments 'FieldSO2+SlowSO2' and 'FieldSO2+DualSO2' exhibited different levels of control between the seasons. Do the physicochemical quality parameters of the berries have any influence (given that they were not measured)? Please include this in the discussion.

Minor

Line 119: “The FieldSO2 (1.4 g de active ingredient …)” Please correct “de”

Comments on the Quality of English Language

No comments

Author Response

Response to Reviewers

Dear Reviewers, first of all, thank you very much for your comments and remarks. We tried to address all of them, and this new version of our manuscript was changed and improved according to your recommendations, as it can be checked below:

Reviewers’ comments:

Reviewer#2:

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript entitled "Active packaging systems to extend the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes" is well-structured and presents interesting results. In my opinion, the article can be published in Horticulturae once the authors address the following issue:

 Considering that the filamentous fungi inoculum count in the control is similar in both seasons (2019, 2020, according to Figure 5), please explain why treatments 'FieldSO2+SlowSO2' and 'FieldSO2+DualSO2' exhibited different levels of control between the seasons. Do the physicochemical quality parameters of the berries have any influence (given that they were not measured)? Please include this in the discussion.

Ok, changes made. See L314-321.

Line 119: “The FieldSO2 (1.4 g de active ingredient …)” Please correct “de”.

Ok, changes made.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper “Active packaging systems to extend the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes” is an interesting paper about an hot topic. The use of sulfur dioxide is a current topic and this research investigates some useful solutions to mitigate some unwanted effects. The introduction is clear, the bibliographic sources are sufficient and updated, the objectives are clearly stated. The M&Ms are appropriate but additional data are request. The results are consistent, and their discussion is relevant. The conclusions and discussion are supported by the results obtained. However, the main weakness is the rather obvious results obtained. The authors should highlight what the innovative and unexpected elements actually are.

Below are some necessary changes:

L-67-70: It is necessary to include some considerations on the regulatory aspects: for example, in Italy table grapes cannot be treated with SO2 for sale in Italy, but it can only be done if destined for foreign countries.

L119: “de” may be “of”?

L102-128: It was not reported whether the grapes, in the field, were subjected to treatments against B. cinerea, and if so, how long has passed since the last treatment. Furthermore, it is not reported how the grapes were harvested and how they were divided among the treatments. Were the grapes used for one treatment harvested from different plants/rows than other treatments? If this is not the case, how did we proceed to make the initial distribution of the pathogen homogeneous or avoid unpredicted differences between tests?

L168: please add more details about quantification and/or add references.

Fig. 5 (and text comments): here is reported CFU after treatments, but not before (time zero). At line 168 you state that “Before and after treatment […] filamentous fungi was performed on the skin surface of berries”. This approach would actually be useful to understand if, before each treatment, the different batches of grapes were infected in a similar way.

L335-336: In my opinion, here is the weakest point of the paper. The fact that the "strongest" treatment gives the best results in terms of containment is rather obvious. There are also references (L341) to confirm this. Even the subsequent comments (L342-364) do not suggest any particular novelty in the information provided.

L374: this sentence is ambiguous, as it is not clear whether, however, there are any effects in other cultivars.

L382-404: regardless of the difference in the results obtained from the different treatments, the authors should explain more clearly whether the lighter and less performing treatments still give satisfactory and comparable results from a commercial point of view.

 

Author Response

Response to Reviewers

Dear Reviewers, first of all, thank you very much for your comments and remarks. We tried to address all of them, and this new version of our manuscript was changed and improved according to your recommendations, as it can be checked below:

 Reviewers’ comments:

Reviewer#3:

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper “Active packaging systems to extend the shelf life of ‘Italia’ table grapes” is an interesting paper about an hot topic. The use of sulfur dioxide is a current topic and this research investigates some useful solutions to mitigate some unwanted effects. The introduction is clear, the bibliographic sources are sufficient and updated, the objectives are clearly stated. The M&Ms are appropriate but additional data are request. The results are consistent, and their discussion is relevant. The conclusions and discussion are supported by the results obtained. However, the main weakness is the rather obvious results obtained. The authors should highlight what the innovative and unexpected elements actually are.

Below are some necessary changes:

L-67-70: It is necessary to include some considerations on the regulatory aspects: for example, in Italy table grapes cannot be treated with SO2 for sale in Italy, but it can only be done if destined for foreign countries. Ok, changes made. See L70-79.

L119: “de” may be “of”?

Ok, changes made.

L102-128: It was not reported whether the grapes, in the field, were subjected to treatments against B. cinerea, and if so, how long has passed since the last treatment. Furthermore, it is not reported how the grapes were harvested and how they were divided among the treatments. Were the grapes used for one treatment harvested from different plants/rows than other treatments? If this is not the case, how did we proceed to make the initial distribution of the pathogen homogeneous or avoid unpredicted differences between tests? Ok, changes made. See L116-120.

L168: please add more details about quantification and/or add references.

Ok. The details of this quantification are better described in the section 2.5. Gray mold incidence and quantification of filamentous fungi on berry skin, where a citation (Youssef and Roberto, 2014) had been already added to the text.

Fig. 5 (and text comments): here is reported CFU after treatments, but not before (time zero). At line 168 you state that “Before and after treatment […] filamentous fungi was performed on the skin surface of berries”. This approach would actually be useful to understand if, before each treatment, the different batches of grapes were infected in a similar way.

Ok. In L377-388, including Figure 4, it was described the assessment of filamentous fungi population before the FieldSO2 treatment was applied (right after harvesting the grapes in the field).

L335-336: In my opinion, here is the weakest point of the paper. The fact that the "strongest" treatment gives the best results in terms of containment is rather obvious. There are also references (L341) to confirm this. Even the subsequent comments (L342-364) do not suggest any particular novelty in the information provided.

Dear Reviewer, thanks for your comment, however, we would like to state that we decided to emphasize these comments in this section, even though it looks like logic, because most of the results published so far are related to the use of the most common SO₂ pads (slow phase or dual phase release), and not to ultrafast pads. Thus, it will give readers a more accurate knowledge about our results.

L374: this sentence is ambiguous, as it is not clear whether, however, there are any effects in other cultivars.

Ok. Changes made. See L430-437.

L382-404: regardless of the difference in the results obtained from the different treatments, the authors should explain more clearly whether the lighter and less performing treatments still give satisfactory and comparable results from a commercial point of view.

Ok. changes made. See L464-469.

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. section 2.2, the refrigeration temperature should be clear

2.sample 2019 2020 2019 2020 The reasons affecting Gray mold incidence should be explained

3. Figure 5. Units should be CFU/g

4. It is a pity that Fig 4-5 fails to present a different analysis perspective.

6. Although it is a research topic with industrial applicability, it is too poor in terms of data presentation and analysis index quality.

Author Response

Response to Reviewers

 

Dear Reviewers, first of all, thank you very much for your comments and remarks. We tried to address all of them, and this new version of our manuscript was changed and improved according to your recommendations, as it can be checked below:

Reviewers’ comments:

Reviewer#4:

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. section 2.2, the refrigeration temperature should be clear.

Ok, changes made in L128.

2.sample 2019 2020 2019 2020 The reasons affecting Gray mold incidence should be explained.

Ok, changes made. See L299-306.

3. Figure 5. Units should be CFU/g.

As described in section Material and Methods section: 2.5. Gray mold incidence and quantification of filamentous fungi on berry skin, the methodology was based on Youssef and Roberto (2014) [21], and the used unit is CFU/berry. In this case, 10 berries per plot was assessed as previously described.

4. It is a pity that Fig 4-5 fails to present a different analysis perspective.

The title of Figures 2 and 3 (formerly Figures 4 and 5) was changed to better explain the meaning of it. The main reason to present Figure 2 is to show the effect of FieldSO₂ pad to eradicate the spores of filamentous fungi from berry surface, as well to quantify it for each treatment.

6. Although it is a research topic with industrial applicability, it is too poor in terms of data presentation and analysis index quality.

The manuscript was improved through the entire body according to the main comments provided by reviewers in order to better present the data.

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I have no further questions