Biomonitoring: Developing a Beehive Air Volatiles Profile as an Indicator of Environmental Contamination Using a Sustainable In-Field Technique

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This manuscript developed a portable membrane inlet mass spectrometry instrument to monitor volatile organic compounds from beehives as a method of assessing the contamination level of environment surrounding bees. Such a development of technique with cost-effectiveness and efficiency may provide valuable information to help facilitate the current worldwide topic of sustainable development and environment-friendly human society. From this perspective, this manuscript presents its contribution. However, despite this merit, this manuscript can be improved further in some key parts. 

 

Major comments

 

1. The experiments are actually very simple only with limited data collection and analysis, which can be summarized in “analyzing the compounds of beehives using the developed monitoring technique”. There are 4 figures and 1 table. But only figure 2 and the table showed the experiment result showing analyzed compounds. Other 3 figures, figure 1 is the photo of the instrumentation taken from the in-field beehive. Figures 3 and 4 look like screenshot. Can authors explain how many beehives were monitored to analyze the compounds? As a new technique, it was only used in the area marked in figures 3 and 4. I think it will be more helpful and can provide more valuable information about this technique in monitoring the environment contamination if authors can employ this technique in several distantly different areas. This can determine its performance and sensitivity to help get more applied. 

 

2. Because authors used this method to test the volatile air compounds inside the beehives. I believe the organic compound sources are difficult to track. How authors rule out that compounds are not from the bees themselves? For example, the catabolism occurred inside the body of bees, during which organic compounds were emitted. Also, the excretion of bees can also cause many organic compounds. So, how accurate is this method in monitoring the environmental contamination?

 

3. About Figure 1, because it is a newly developed monitoring method, it will be helpful to get a sense of how it looks if authors can show the contents inside yellow box if available. Additionally, the caption of figure 1 is confusing. Authors described a), b), and c), but I can not find these letters on the figure. 

 

4. Figures 3 and 4 are more like screenshot. The information on these figures are not clear enough to read. I cannot get much specific information from them. The beehives were located at the red marker site, how authors know those analyzed compounds are not directly from the air surrounding the beehives rather than from environment where bees work? 

 

5. The experiments authors did lack control group. For example, it will be helpful if authors can provide data from monitoring empty beehives in the same location as the experimental group. I think it will further validate the availability of this monitoring methods. 

 

6. Authors claimed that the analyzed pesticide compounds are possibly from the agricultural land. It is possible not because many urban houses use cleaning liquids or insect repellent like mosquito repellent that also contain the ingredients of pesticides. This is also a key point to keep in mind when evaluating the pollutant sources.

 

Minor comments.

 

1. For the abstract, lines 24-25, authors used “will” like “samples will be taken from….”. These experiments were already done, so they should be corrected to “were” or others. 

2. line 45, the sentence needs gramma double check. 

 

3. line 48, what does it mean “climate 48 change”?

 

4. line 52, “although is difficult to…….” Needs double check. 

 

5. line 141, “a major global issue that are linked to….” needs correction.

 

6. for table 1, what is retention time? It should be explained. Add table caption. 

Comments on the Quality of English Language

English language is good. Only several minor edits are required.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your time and effort for the review of our manucript. We acknowledged all your comments and suggestions and adjusted our manuscript accordingly. In the attachment you can fined point-by-point responses to all your comments, with references to the changes made in the manucript.

Kind regards,

Daria Ilić

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This manuscript provide a sustainable in-field usage of the portable membrane inlet mass spectrometry (MIMS) instrument for instant and effective determination of the level of  environmental pollution by analytical identification of hive atmosphere volatile organic compound. There are some places need further improvement.

1 line 108: why no subtitle for upper paragraphs? 1.1 and 1.2 are not the parallel relationship subtitle.

2 Figure 2: Please improve the quality of the figure.

3 Others were labeled in the attachment.

 

1. What is the main question addressed by the research? A sustainable in-field usage of the portable membrane inlet mass spectrometry (MIMS) instrument for instant and effective determination of the level of environmental pollution. 2. What parts do you consider original or relevant for the field? What specific gap in the field does the paper address? A portable membrane inlet mass spectrometry (MIMS) instrument for determination of the level of air pollution.   3. What does it add to the subject area compared with other published material? A new method to determine the level of air pollution. 4. What specific improvements should the authors consider regarding the methodology? What further controls should be considered? The air around the hive should be determined. 5. Please describe how the conclusions are or are not consistent with the evidence and arguments presented. Please also indicate if all main questions posed were addressed and by which specific experiments. The MIMS results will be benchmarked against a conventional laboratory sampling technique. 6. Are the references appropriate? Yes. 7. Please include any additional comments on the tables and figures and quality of the data.

The quality of the figure is not good.

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

These errors were labeled in the attachment.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your time and effort for the review of our manuscript. We acknowledged all your commnets and suggestions and adjust our manuscript accordingly.

In the attachment you can found Word file with point-by-point responses to all your comments, with references to the changes made in the manucript.

Kind regards,

Daria Ilić

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

sustainability-2841124 Reviewer comments

 

Manuscript sustainability-2841124: Biomonitoring: Developing a beehive air volatiles profile as an indicator of environmental contamination using a sustainable in-field technique

 

The manuscript is very interesting. The authors present sustainable in-field usage of the portable membrane inlet mass spectrometry (MIMS) instrument for instant and effective determination of the level of environmental pollution by analytical identification of hive atmosphere volatile organic compound (VOCs) contaminants, contained in polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), monocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (BTEX) compounds, and pesticides. The samples were taken from hives that are located in urbanized and rural regions, where differences in contamination are highlighted. The MIMS results were benchmarked against a conventional laboratory sampling technique such as GC-MS.

 

The uniqueness of the text higher than 90% by antiplagiarism.net

 

The experimental methods and statistics are correct.

 

The English is almost good but need some correction by native speaker..

 

There are some mistakes and comments:

 

1) Line 30 - Thay - should be - They.

2) Line 226 - in Figure 2 - Abudance - should be - Abundance.) 

3) There is no control group in the experiment.

4) Please add the GPS coordinates of your apiary location. Add the name of the place where your apiary is located.

5) How many honey bee colonies you analysed for your conclusions?

6) There is no statistical analysis.

7) Why can’t your device just analyze the air in a given area? Why did you decide to study the air inside the hive?

8) At what time of year was the study conducted? It is important to write this in the article.

9) The authors wrote: Samples were taken twice a month for 4 months. On what basis did you determine this sampling frequency?

10) What is the duration of each sampling and what volume of air was analyzed?

11) Why do you write so much about honeybee sounds if you don't analyze or discuss it? You can remove the part about sound.

 

Please improve the manuscript according to the above comments.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Minor editing of the English language is required.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for your time and effort fot the review of our manuscript. We acknowledged all your comments and suggestions and adjusted our manuscript accordingly.

In the attachment, you can find a Word file with point-by-point responses to all your comments, including references to the changes made in the manuscript.

Kind regards,

Daria Ilić

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I have no more questions. I recommend that this manuscript can be accepted for publication.