Genome-Wide Identification and Expression Analyses of the 4-Coumarate: CoA Ligase (4CL) Gene Family in Eucommia ulmoides

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors of this article used Eucommia ulmoides, a medicinal plant with high chlorogenic acid as an experimental material. They screened the genome of E. ulmoides to identify 4-coumarate: CoA ligase (4CL) genes. 4CL is an important rate limiting enzyme in phenylpropanoid metabolism, which plays an important role in biosynthesis of phenylpropanoid, flavonoid, lignin and other secondary metabolites in plants. Among this chlorogenic acid is an important secondary metabolite. Screening of E. ulmoides genome resulted in the identification of 35 Eu4CL genes. They further analyzed gene structure, conserved domains, evolutionary relationship, and expression patterns of these genes. They also detected that some of the Eu4CL genes differential expression pattern under cold, methyl jasmonate and ethylene response as assessed by qPCR and thus speculate that these genes could be involved in abiotic and biotic stress. They further found that the about four genes were positively correlated with the chlorogenic acid content in leaves and bark and some genes were specific to the type of tissue as well as multiple genes were involved in chlorogenic acid biosynthesis.

This study provides some basic and initial information of the genes involved in biosynthesis of chlorogenic acid and provides some reference to future work in the molecular characterization and biological functions of these genes. The article is clear and concise, the methods, results and corresponding discussion is clear and apt. However, I have a couple of questions/suggestions:

 

·         One of the major concerns is that the axis texts are not legible in figures, 7, 8, 10, and 11 which makes it difficult to interpret them and connect them to the results.

·         Section 2.2 on line 84 needs more information of the method. May be describe Liu’s method in brief.

·         Edit the manuscript for consistency regarding how “e-value” is written. For example, on line 96 its written “E-value” and on line 144 its written “e-value” please check whole manuscript. Similarly, “cDNA”, “qRT-PCR” terms need to be corrected throughout the manuscript.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for your comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Genome-wide identification and expression analyses of the 4-coumarate: CoA ligase (4CL) gene family in Eucommia ulmoides”(ID: forests-1806291). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked with different colors in the paper. Please see the attachment for the specific revisions

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

1. Abstract needs to be re-written for better clarity. Scientific standards of an abstract should be maintained.

 

2. Language editing is required. 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for your comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Genome-wide identification and expression analyses of the 4-coumarate: CoA ligase (4CL) gene family in Eucommia ulmoides”(ID: forests-1806291). Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the Important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked with different colors in the paper.Please see the attachment for the specific revisions.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx