Physiological and Biochemical Mechanisms of Exogenous Melatonin Regulation of Saline–Alkali Tolerance in Oats
, Weiwei Xu 1,3,†, Changzhong Ren 1, Chao Zhan 1, Chunlong Wang 1, Junwei Li 1, Qinyong Ren 1,3, Xiaotian Liang 1,3, Liming Wei 1, Dabing Xiang 2, Junying Wang 4,* and Laichun Guo 1,2,*
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The manuscript agronomy-2373614 entitled “Physiological and biochemical mechanisms of exogenous melatonin regulation of saline-alkali tolerance in oats” aimed to evaluate the effect of seed soaking with melatonin in different application time and concentration on seed germination index and plant defense response under salt-alkali stress.
The author reported that different concentration and application time improved the seed germination, and the 100 100 μmol·L-1 melatonin showed the best results.
The manuscript is well written and designed that could be published after minor revision.
The abstract has too long sentence (Line: 22-26; 26-32) and I suggest to reformulated.
Abbreviation must be defined at first mentioned, please revise the introduction.
Preferably to prove the sensitivity of the used variety to salt-alkali soil with previous experiments or considerable reference.
I suggest to re-present the first experiment 16 treatments in Table, to be more clear.
The seed germination index calculation procedure must be supported by considerable references.
Line 282-285: I suggest to remove this sentence as it already showed in Table.
Line 364 also 379; this sentence could be moved to discussion part.
Some used references are very old, which should be updated, if applicable.
Nothing
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
agronomy-2373614-peer-review-v1
Article: Physiological and Biochemical Mechanisms of Exogenous Melatonin Regulation of Saline-alkali Tolerance in Oats.
The idea of the manuscript is unique, new, and complete for publication, with minor corrections
Abstracts: good.
Keywords: add antioxidant enzyme activity.
Introduction:
The introduction was written in a unique way.
Materials and Methods:
What is the authors' evidence for the sensitivity of an oat cultivar to salinity?
Is replicates only one Petri dishes of 30 seeds ? (Experiment 2: five Petri dishes per replicate).
2.3.2. Morphological and Biomass Indicators, the authors reported the use of 10 seedlings, are they seedlings, and if so, at what age? , wherever you plant it in Petri dishes ?
A Comprehensive Evaluation of Different MT Treatments to Improve the Saline alkali Tolerance of Oats, at any age too.
In the second experiment on what basis the authors used concentration a 100 μmol・L-1 MT solution ? Is it just the best treatment?
The experiment was conducted from July 2022 to November 2022 in the greenhouse, a large period of time on two experiments, the first experiment seven days and the second it five days, as you mentioned, please clarify.
Results
Line 270-285: the paragraph needs to be rewritten, focusing on the different transactions, and there is no need to arrange all the transactions.
Discussion: Presented appropriately with the manuscript, with the possibility of abbreviation.
Conclusions: good section.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The reviewed paper is well-written and interesting in terms of the mechanism of melatonin action under stress conditions.
I have four major comments:
1) All tables and figures should be understandable to the reader without reference to the text (please explain all abbreviations)
2) In the present form Tables 1, 2, and 3 are difficult to follow, especially in terms of statistical analysis; please reformat them or break them into smaller ones
3) out of figures 5 to 7, I suggest leaving only the most important one in the main text, and moving the rest to the supplement
4) I suggest shortening the discussion section by omitting very obvious facts
Additional minor comments:
- Please change the '1st d.' to '1st day'
- there are missing data for the unit used in Figures - is it g FW or DW?
- use ROS for reactive oxygen species in the text (especially in the Discussion section)
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
