Diversity of Fruit Quality in Astringent and Non−Astringent Persimmon Fruit Germplasm

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors evaluated postharvest quality of different cultivars of persimmon fruits. The topic is interesting and some useful results were provided. However, the introduction is not good enough to elucidate the background of the study. Moreover, the discussion couldn’t well explain the results obtained. Therefore, the manuscript needs to be minor revised before final acceptance.

 

General comments

1. The origin and distribution of persimmon should be introduced, especially in China. Moreover, the typical cultivar of the four types of persimmon, PVA, PCA, PVNA and PCNA, should be mentioned, respectively. In addition, the research progress and background need to be reviewed. Please rewrite the introduction.

2. The discussion was not sufficient to clarify the relationship between the parameters and cultivars, especially interior quality and astringent and non-astringent groups. For example, what’s the relationship between pectin WSP, ISP, and CSP and tannin content? Please re-organize the discussion.

Specific comments

1. Line 69-71: the climate and soil conditions from where the samples derived should be elucidated. Moreover, the maturity of persimmon fruit at harvest should be clarified, including firmness, TSS, and color. Also, the criteria for fruit selection were missed.

2. How many trees are the fruits harvested from for different cultivars? Moreover, how many fruits of each cultivar were used in the experiment?

3. Line 71-74: author chose half of fruits for appearance quality and sensory quality evaluations and the other half for intrinsic quality evaluation. In order to minimized the test error, the same fruit should be used for the experiment.

4. It’s better to change ‘2.2. Appearance qualities measurement’ and ‘2.3. Intrinsic quality measurement’ to ‘2.2 Exterior Quality of Fruit Measurement’ and ‘2.3 Interior Quality of Fruit Measurement’. Moreover, the method of measurement for each indicator must be divided into separate paragraphs.

5. Statistical analysis of data must be clarified in the section of Materials and Methods

6. Principal component analysis can simplify the number of evaluation indicators while preserving most indicator information. Multiple original indicators were converted into a reduced number of independent indicators, making it easier to establish a quality evaluation method for persimmons.

7. Figure 5. showed correlation of appearance, intrinsic and sensory qualities. However, author tried to compare quality of different cultivars, the correlation of exterior, interior, sensory quality and different cultivars (astringent and non-astringent groups) should be elucidated. Please add the relevant results.

8. The English of the manuscript needs to be improved.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript shows the evaluation of different persimmon genotypes in terms of appearance, intrinsic and sensory fruit quality. The results shows a clear division of the persimmon germplasm according to the evaluated variables. The statistical analysis must be described in the manuscript giving details about methods and software used for data analysis. Some parts of the results section has to be moved to the discussion to improve the redaction of the document.

Some corrections and modifications has to be done in the manuscript to improve it. All of them are indicated in the pdf of the manuscript.

Overall, this manuscript shows good results which can be useful for breeders to select parental or other breeding research.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Reviewer 3 Report

Ref: MS titled “Analysis of the diversity of fruit quality in persimmon germplasm”. The work is interesting and contains some novel information. I have few suggestions. Please modify the title as “Diversity of Quality in Astringent and Non-Astringent Persimmon Fruits Germplasm”. Please add some background information the start of the abstract. Also, add one conclusion based sentence. The introduction is well written. I only suggest to please re-checking all abbreviated terms should be explained at their first appearance in the introduction text. Please supplement the information at which stage of maturity the fruits were harvested for quality attributes. In addition, how much material was used for each cultivar/genotype? The results are well written and logical. I think the authors should add pictures of the studied persimmon germplasm if possible in the revised manuscript which will increase the worth of the article. Please improve the discussion by comparing with recent literature available if any. Overall, the quality of the article is appropriate.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Reviewer 4 Report

A paper can be published in Horticulturae after the major revision. The topic fits in with the journal's scopus. The literature items have all been used in the text.

The authors studied the variability of the quality of persimmon fruits from China and Japan. The authors proved the high variability of fruit quality and linked the flavor qualities with the content of sugars and tannins. The publication is interesting, but it requires some corrections:

1. In the Introduction part, the authors in line 32 indicated that the persimmon fruit contains valuable bioactive compounds. Please describe the metabolites in more detail. Another lack in this part is that the authors did not provide literature data on quality analyzes of persimmon fruits.

2. In the Materials and Methods section, the description of the tannin and total phenolic analyzes is very brief. The authors did not provide the exact methodology, did not provide the reference substance to which the values were converted. Also in the Results part, the authors did not present the results of these analyses, they placed the table in additional materials, so it will be very troublesome for the potential reader. Personally, I was unable to open additional materials.

3. In the Discussion part, I ask the authors to refer to the research of other authors and compare the results obtained. In its current form, the discussion is very poor.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

Acceptable for publication in its current form.

Reviewer 4 Report

The authors took into account my suggestions and made corrections. I believe they have improved the text of the publication. I accept the authors' explanations and believe that the text can be published in its present form.