Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: RISE, AND PRONOUNCED REGIONAL VARIATION, IN METHYLPHENIDATE, AMPHETAMINE, AND LISDEXAMFETAMINE DISTRIBUTION IN THE UNITED STATES
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Thank you to the authors for conducting a significant review of the article and incorporating the suggestions and providing adequate comments. The paper has been significantly improved as a result and is now more understandable to an international audience.
I have a couple of pending suggestions for consideration outlined below.
Non-tracked change copy:
Line 122: There is no reference to support this statement. Please add a reference.
Line 200: Please clarify this sentence, it seems conflicting. ‘Alpha values obtained that were below the standard (p < .05) threshold were noted (p < .001).’
Line 201: please write SEM in full for the first time.
Line 263: ‘..difficulties to access health care’. Can you please include a reference.
Line 263: ACA. Please write acronym in full.
Lines 275-277: Please provide a reference. The sentence refers to a study but no reference is provided.
Line 292: starting with ‘Schedule II substances….’ Removed as included in the introduction.

Figures:
Whilst I agree the figures are good and significant work has gone into producing them. My suggestion was in relation to replacing some of the figure with tables, not duplicating the figures with tables. In the epidemiology world a combination of figure and tables is sometimes more suited to the readers. For example, some clinicians prefer data tables, perceiving numbers as less “biased” than a graphic.  Additionally, some figures lack specific number for example 1a, if I were to replicate your study in a different setting, I would not know what numbers to reference to enable a comparison of findings.
Figure 1:
-	1a: you state that a paired t-test was conducted however in the methods it states an unpaired t-test, could you please verify and correct the test used.
-	1a: Can you have at the start of each sentence the corresponding graph or consistently at the end of each sentence please. For example (A,…) is in the middle of the sentence.
-	1a: Was the paired t-test only done for lisdexamfetamine? In the results it has there was a significant difference also for amphetamine however the results weren’t included anywhere. Please provide the p value for all the t-tests.
-	‘Lisdexamfetamine was significantly different from amphetamine (at-test p <0.05) and methylphenidate (mp < 0.05).’ – what figure does this belong too? If this is the same as the following ‘For amphetamine and lisdexamfetamine, there was a significant increase in the
208 total stimulant use compared to 2010 starting from 2014 (Figure 1A).’ in the results section, I would remove from the figure description as it is causing confusion or add extra clarity.

Figure 4 and 5:
-	I am still not sure of what the value is of the figures 4 and 5, whilst the figures are good to know, I am not sure what the rationale is in including them, you state in the methods that this information was going to be used to ‘identifying sources of potential inefficiency in spending’, however I cannot see where this is completed and how you may draw a conclusion on this.  Rationale on why this is included is needed, additionally why 2018 data was selected as opposed to 2017 data to align with your study data. Having a clearer aim in relation to the use of the data and reworking the methods, will supporting in addressing this gap.
An additional review and refinement of the results and figures to ensure they align and also align with the methods would further strengthen the manuscript and improve the readability.
Experimental design: See above
Validity of the findings: See above
Additional comments: See above


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NUMEROSITY PERCEPTION AND MATHEMATICS ABILITY IN ADULTS: THE MODERATING ROLE OF DOTS NUMBER
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Dear authors,
I am pleased to review a manuscript that I consider very informative in the field of numerical cognition. I appreciate the motivation of filling a very specific gap with important theoretical and educational contribution. I recommend this article for publication but only after a major revision motivated by the comments reported below, in the target sections. In particular, I ask you to address points related to introduction, method and discussion. Moreover, I suggest you to improve formal aspects related to the article structure and language. Finally, I encourage you to add a figure as a graphic visualization of the main findings.

BACKGROUND: The introduction needs more detail. I suggest you to further elaborate the paragraph on predictors of math abilities (lines 36-45). An informative organization could consider domain-general predictors (memory, EC and language) and domain-specific predictors. This last domain should contemplate not only the Approximate Number System (ANS) but also the Symbolic Number Comparison (SNC): Indeed, it has been recently shown how during development, the SNC becomes the better domain-specific predictor of math abilities (Caviola et al., 2020, DOI: 10.1111/desc.12957) and of ANS itself (Lyons et al., 2018, doi.org/10.1037/dev0000445; Lau et al., 2021, doi.org/10.1037/dev0001158). Even if the inclusion of the SNC as task in your method would have allowed more comprehensive conclusions; at least in the introduction, its role should not be overlooked.

ENGLISH LANGUAGE: The English language should be improved. Some examples include lines 81-83, 102, 160 and the long period from line 198 to line 202. The current phrasing does not affect comprehension but gives the impression that the article was written under time pressure, without an accurate checking. In line 106, the subtitle “Measures” is not appropriate and should be replaced with “Apparatus and software”.

ARTICLE STRUCTURE: The paragraphs are correctly divided, but more subtitles would help the reader better organize the material. For instance, the four paragraphs belonging to the Result section could be labelled as follows: “Math scores”, “Math abilities and domain-specific skills”, “Math abilities and domain-general skills”, “Math abilities and small numerosity perception”.

FIGURE: I encourage you to add a figure as a graphic visualization of the main findings.
Experimental design: AIMS AND SCOPE: The relevance of the research questions in the field of education and rehabilitation should be highlighted to make the article more in line with the scope of the target Journal.

METHOD: The method should be described with more details to ensure replicability. I list below relevant information, currently missing in the manuscript.

Apparatus: Does the setting include the use of a chin rest to ensure standard and steady posture of all participants across the different trials?

Procedure: Which was the order in which participants performed the different tasks?

Numerosity perception:
-	Were the small and large number conditions blocked (as stated in line 87) and also counterbalanced?
-	Were the patches of equal size? What size were they?
-	How do you motivate the administration of so few practice trials compared to Anobile et al., 2014?

Domain-general skills: Since the “Set-switching ability” paragraph starts with definition of the ability, object of interest, and proceeds with description of task used to assess it, I suggest you to keep the same structure with all the domain-general skills by adding a short definition.
Validity of the findings: CONCLUSIONS: The conclusion is concise but not comprehensive. I would appreciate if you could add interpretation of the marginal correlation between visual-spatial memory and math ability and, most importantly, of the selective correlation between inhibition ability and discrimination of small numerosity. As a speculation, inhibition could help extract abstract numerical properties from continuous properties.

IMPLICATION: Implications in the field of education and rehabilitation would make the article more interesting for the readers of the Journal.
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NUMEROSITY PERCEPTION AND MATHEMATICS ABILITY IN ADULTS: THE MODERATING ROLE OF DOTS NUMBER
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: In the current study, the authors asked whether numerosity is a predictor of formal mathematical ability in adults. The results showed a significant correlation but only when the numerosity perception was tested with relatively low numerosities. The study replicates and extends what was previously shown in a study with children.
The study is interesting and well conducted. I have a few considerations (which I list below), related to minor methodological issues and more importantly on how the results were shown.
Experimental design: Methods:
Stimuli have been selected with the Method of Constant stimuli that varied the number of dots from 50% to 200%. Into which and how many steps has this interval been divided (would be probably good to list the numerosity used)? I believe it is important to know for two reasons: 1) for replicability 2) it differs from some studies (including Anobile et al 2014 psy science and Anobile et al 2016 Dev psych) where the QUEST adaptive method was used instead. I think it is also worth discussing the possibility that this methodological difference may have led to the difference between the studies in the value of the w found between high and low numerosities.
Validity of the findings: Results:

1) Given that mathematics was measured with several subtests, and given that it has previously been shown that not all mathematical tasks equally correlate with numerosity estimation (at least in children , Anobile, Sievano, Burr 2013), it would be interesting to also show the correlations between w and the different math subtests (for both low and high numerosities separately).

2) While I have nothing against showing results by means of tables, I advise the authors to also show the data by means of correlation graphs, at least for zero-order correlations between w and maths (separately for low and high numerosities). Besides facilitating the understanding of the main results, it is also important because it allows to show individual subjects data, which otherwise would never be visible in the current form of the ms.
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NUMEROSITY PERCEPTION AND MATHEMATICS ABILITY IN ADULTS: THE MODERATING ROLE OF DOTS NUMBER
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Dear Editor Giorgio Vallortigara and authors Sun Ji and Sun Pei,
even if in the reply to reviewers the reference to the modified or added lines did not match the ones in the revised article, it was possible to appreciate the revision process. The authors replied to each points raised by the reviewers in a comprehensive way. Therefore, I am glad to endorse this version of the manuscript for publication and I congratulate the authors for the important contribution to the research and the editor for his efficient job.

Yours faithfully,

Arianna Felisatti
Experimental design: no comment
Validity of the findings: no comment
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NUMEROSITY PERCEPTION AND MATHEMATICS ABILITY IN ADULTS: THE MODERATING ROLE OF DOTS NUMBER
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The authors did a great job with the revision. I have no further comments.
Experimental design: The authors did a great job with the revision. I have no further comments.
Validity of the findings: The authors did a great job with the revision. I have no further comments.
Additional comments: The authors did a great job with the revision. I have no further comments.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INTERPOPULATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NUTRITIONAL CONDITION OF AEQUIYOLDIA EIGHTSII (PROTOBRANCHIA: NUCULANIDAE) FROM THE WESTERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA DURING AUSTRAL SUMMER
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Overall this article is well written, easy to read and follows a logical sequence. It meets the standards of the journal and will be a valuable contribution to this field of research.

The introduction needs to include more information on the specific study sites, since the aim of the manuscript is to look at biochemical condition along an environmental gradient. Some improvements to the statistical analyses and graphs will improve the overall quality of the manuscript. The results and discussion section could be more concisely written and in some cases, statements in the discussion section need more clarification.

I recommend publication after some changes are made to improve the manuscript.  These changes are outlined in my specific reviewer comments below.
Experimental design: No additional comments other than those in the reviewers comments below.
Validity of the findings: The overall conclusions made about the data are reasonable, but some additional justification for these conclusions are needed in some cases. This can be achieved by providing additional references and clarifying some of the statements in the discussion, as specified in the reviewer's comments.
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INTERPOPULATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NUTRITIONAL CONDITION OF AEQUIYOLDIA EIGHTSII (PROTOBRANCHIA: NUCULANIDAE) FROM THE WESTERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA DURING AUSTRAL SUMMER
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: In general the manuscript is well constructed, although it could benefit from proof-reading by one of the English speaking co-authors.

For example, lines 114 starts with the same word as the previous sentence.

Another sentence which did not make sense to me (although I understood what was meant), was on lines 370 - 372. I think this needs rephrasing for clarification.

Lines 442 – 445 were not clear and needs rephrasing. I am not sure the association with Thorsons Rule is necessary, as there is quite a narrow latitudinal range being investigated. It also comes a bit out of the blue, with no prior explanation of what Thorsons Rule is (and its controversies).

Lines 446 – 452 should also be reconsidered, it replicates what is said in the conclusions below, but far less clearly. It either needs rephrasing or scrapping altogether as it perhaps isn’t required.

Other minor wording issues are likely to be corrected at the copy-editing stage.

The references used were appropriate and up to date, and the background to the study was presented clearly. There are an appropriate number of figures, and the structure of the manuscript is regular. The results presented are relevant to the aims of the manuscript, and raw data has been made available as part of the supplementary information.
Experimental design: The manuscripts fits the aims and scopes of the journal, and has a defined and relevant purpose. The introduction gives appropriate background and states how this fills a knowledge gap, with similar work recently being published, although in a different context and species, by the lead author (Bascur et al. 2020). However, the introduction would benefit from stating the significance of this research, why it matters, especially as it may be considered to non-polar researchers as being a rather small biogeographic region.

The methods are clear and reproducible. I do however have a concern regarding the methods used which require clarification, and perhaps warrants mentioning in the manuscript. It is stated in the method that samples were preserved in ethanol at -80, and were collected at different times (2017 and 2018). Detail regarding the time between collection, and when tissue samples were analysed is important here, as it may have a significant impact on the results. Samples for protein and lipid analysis are usually frozen immediately at point of collection – ironically in the Antarctic this is not always possible, due to transportation issues. It is however my understanding that protein and lipid analyses are affected by preservation in ethanol, especially lipids which can become soluble in solvents. Proteins can also denature and precipitate, which may affect the outcome of your protein assay. Please can you provide comments on this, as it may affect the comparability of your results to other studies and may explain some of the variability that you have found?  How long was there between sample collection and lab analysis, and could this have affected the outcome if the measured lipids and proteins were degrading in this time?

While it is mentioned in the discussion (see section below), the interannual variability in temperature between the sites should also be better considered, as temperature may well have increased the metabolism of the organisms, and therefore affected the lipid/protein concentrations. Additionally, this change in temperature may well have changed the type of food available to the organism (even if Chl. a concentrations were the same), and therefore affected the energy available in the form of primary production. Without an analysis of the sediments to confirm, it is only speculation to suggest that this did, or did not have an effect on the results, but it cannot be ruled out.
Validity of the findings: Studies of this type are not common in the Antarctic, and often overcome challenges with sample collection and transport to the host institution. The findings do represent an important advance on our knowledge regarding energetics in an important seafloor species

The data have been provided in a format which is easy to reuse if required, and appear statistically sound. The methods appear robust, although I would seek clarification regarding the differential amount of time the samples were stored in solvents before extraction of proteins and lipids, and the effect this may have on total lipid and proteins detected.

With some rephrasing in sections, as stated above, the overall discussion and conclusions are clear and follow a narrative set-out in the introduction. I do have some further comments on specific parts of the manuscript which I outline below.
Additional comments: Figures
You state in your figure legends that your present means and SD, but you present boxplots. Boxplots typically present the median and interquartile ranges (or hinges), with outliers at the extremities. This not an uncommon mistake, but the two are quite different and therefore show different things.

A mean value can be added to the boxplot, or perhaps a different mean and SD plot would be more appropriate as you have statistically compared the means? If keeping the boxplots please change to the correct definitions in the legend, and I would highly recommend adding the data as ‘jitter’ to show the spread of data over the boxplot. This is now considered best practise for the transparency of data, and can help to show how your data is distributed.

Discussion

Line 363 – what is meant by poor(er?) nutritional condition? Lower protein? Lower lipids? Closer site – closer to what? The glacier edge I presume? Just needs a bit of clarification to make it easier to understand what you mean.
Line 418 – you mention here temporal variations in reproduction should be a minor consideration, but there could also be spatial variations between the known reproductive status at Rothera, and unknown status at the other sites. Worth bearing this in mind.
Line 420 – Gonad development can take over 12 months in polar regions, perhaps up to 24 months, so energy allocation to gonad development could be larger than anticipated.
Line 430 – you suggest that temperature may not have a great effect on the species physiology, in relation to the significant difference in interannual temperature variations at the middle site. This is a surprising statement as they are highly adapted to a low temperature environment with very little temperature fluctuation. I strongly suspect this variation did have an effect on the metabolic activity of the animals, and also on the quality of food available at the seafloor and in the sediments.
Line 432 – More information is needed hear regarding glycogen. What would it have shown or not shown? Why is it important?
Line 439 – You mention here you used widely used marine protocols, but there are no example references. This would be very useful, especially with examples of other studies with ethanol stored samples.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INTERPOPULATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NUTRITIONAL CONDITION OF AEQUIYOLDIA EIGHTSII (PROTOBRANCHIA: NUCULANIDAE) FROM THE WESTERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA DURING AUSTRAL SUMMER
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 3

Output:
Basic reporting: I think in the writing for the results there is too much text to deliver what is essentially only a small amount of information. There are many numbers provided which clutter the text and are unnecessarily repeating the same data already provided in the graphs/tables. Overall, the manuscript presents only a small amount of results; below I have provided an example of how the same results information for the entire study could be condensed into only four clear sentences for the results text:

"Shell length did not vary significantly among the study locations (fig. 2a). Significant variation among locations was found for all other variables, being soft tissue dry mass (fig. 2b), lipid content (fig. 3a), lipid proportions (fig. 3b), protein content (fig. 3c), protein percentages (fig. 3d), energy content (fig. 4), total fatty acids, saturated fatty acids, monounsaturated fatty acids, polyunsaturated fatty acids n-6, polyunsaturated fatty acids n-3, and total polyunsaturated fatty acids (Table 1). In all these cases, greater values occurred at O’Higgins station compared to Yelcho and Rothera, except for soft tissue dry mass which was lowest at Rothera but similar between the other two stations. Multivariate fatty acid profiles also differed significantly among locations (Table 2)."
Experimental design: The study aims to perform a basic comparison among three locations in nutritional values of an Antarctic bivalve, using samples taken of 58 bivalve individuals. Potentially, any differences found could be related to differences in environmental conditions.

Ideally, a comparison like this should also involve direct measurements of the environmental conditions at the different locations. Even with such measurements, any relationship discussed between biotic and abiotic variables would only involve speculation in the absence of proper statistics (e.g. correlation analysis) between biotic and environmental data, which was not done.

As large a number of data points as possible should be used with varying environmental conditions to detect effectively any biotic gradient resulting from environmental variability, but in this study only three locations were used (i.e. even if an attempt was made to test biotic and abiotic data correlation, any given test could only have three data points). There was much discussion about a few factors that may be involved in causing spatial variability in nutrients of this species based on previous research, but a huge number of different environmental or other types of variables could be involved; statistical correlations or direct experimental tests would be most useful on such a topic.

Overall, the results from testing biotic differences among locations only really relates to patterns of spatial variability, which is to be expected as a basic type of variability occurring in all ecological systems, and in most cases is treated as random variation occurring alongside the variation of importance for testing some specific ecological hypothesis.

Only when I got to the discussion at line 421 did I pick up that one of the locations was sampled in a different year to the others (Yelcho in 2017, the other two in 2018), which means the spatial variability is mixed up with temporal variability anyway. I do not think it is useful/informative for the location sampled in 2017 to be directly compared to the others, because in the tests as have been done currently, its not possible for the differences found to be related to anything - maybe or maybe not the differences are related to spatial variability, maybe or maybe not to temporal. And any such spatiotemporal variability may or may not be related to warming, glaciers, salinity, latitudinal gradient, gametogenesis etc.

At a minimum, I would say that the locations would need to be sampled at the same time e.g. the same week or month (within the same year), but even this would provide only a relatively uninformative test of basic spatial variability. It would be best to have numerous locations spanning an environmental gradient to allow statistical correlation between the environmental factor of interest and the nutritional status of populations of this species.
Validity of the findings: As stated in my comments about the experimental design, I do not think the findings are valid given that one location was sampled at a different year to the others, thus variability of nutrient status among different locations (independent of variability among different sampling times) has not actually been tested for as stated. The links made in the manuscript text of the biotic data to environmental factors also have limited validity because based on the current data they are only speculation.
Additional comments: Line 40-41: It is confusing that the first sentence of the abstract is about warming (which I guess is referring to climatic warming) but the focus of the study is molluscan nutrient composition. I would start the abstract at the current line 44, and at the end of the abstract add a sentence about how the variability detected may be associated with many environmental processes, among which is climatic warming and effects of marine-terminating glaciers.

line 414: delete "much needed", or provide some text and references to justify why there is a high need for such baselines in this food web relative to the many other types of food webs for which such baselines would also be useful.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INTERPOPULATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NUTRITIONAL CONDITION OF AEQUIYOLDIA EIGHTSII (PROTOBRANCHIA: NUCULANIDAE) FROM THE WESTERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA DURING AUSTRAL SUMMER
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: All previous comments have been addressed and I thank the authors for being thorough. My only, minor suggestion, is a small improvement to the jitter added to the boxplots. By randomly spreading the jitter you can see the distribution of data points so they do not overlap, and also change the size to differentiate from the outliers.

If you have used ggplot, the code is "geom_jitter(width = 0.2, size = 2)". You can also customise the width and size to suit.
Experimental design: I am satisfied that the previously highlighted concerns have been adequately explained or justified. Methods used have been clarified.
Validity of the findings: I am satisfied that the validity of the findings are proportional to the shortcomings, and the conclusions are appropriate.
Additional comments: I would like to thank the authors for the detailed response to the comments, which makes the review process easier. The manuscript as it stands has better readability. I have suggested minor revisions because of my suggested change to the boxplots. However, I will leave this at the editors discretion, and the manuscript is otherwise ready to accept.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INTERPOPULATIONAL DIFFERENCES IN THE NUTRITIONAL CONDITION OF AEQUIYOLDIA EIGHTSII (PROTOBRANCHIA: NUCULANIDAE) FROM THE WESTERN ANTARCTIC PENINSULA DURING AUSTRAL SUMMER
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: line 157: change to "these data were".

line 366: correct the typo here.
Experimental design: The experimental design is basically allowing comparison of the nutritional and morphological characteristics among three different sampling contexts (i.e. two locations sampling at one month/season, and a third sampled at a different month/season). The inferences that can be gained from analysing data from these sampling contexts together are limited, as it is unknown whether differences are from variability that was spatial or temporal or both. Distinguishing and characterising spatiotemporal variability is normally the first step in understanding ecological patterns, which has not been done for the three locations here, rather it has only been shown that some kind of variability overall occurs. However, using analyses like these to test differences among sampling contexts is still technically valid (even if not too rigorous), and the results may be useful for guiding further research that can better characterise exactly what kind of variability is occurring. The limitations and reasons behind them have now been better explained in this revision.
Validity of the findings: no comment
Additional comments: 340-342: it would be good for some actual distance measurements to be provided here (I guess these measurements could be made from satellite or aerial imagery).

403-404: maybe change the wording for the argument made here - some simple correlations with environmental data could have been made by just using a thermometer and a refractometer on water from the positions where each sample was collected, without any need for an oceanographic monitoring program.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: SEQUENCE CHARACTERISTICS AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF H9N2 SUBTYPE AVIAN INFLUENZA A VIRUSES DETECTED FROM POULTRY AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN CHINA, 2018
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: This manuscript summarizes AI surveillance efforts in different provinces in China. While the results provided are interesting and conclusions can be drawn that can benefit the prevention strategies currently used, the manuscript needs some work to be of publishable quality. In the materials and methods section, additional methodologies need to be explained. The results need to be discussed in the discussion section rather than in the results section. Some clarification of the surveillance design is also needed. The organization of the figures need to be revised. I suggest adding to the manuscript a clear hypothesis and objectives to give organization to the report.
Experimental design: Clearly stated hypothesis and objectives would improve the organization of this manuscript. A revision of the materials and methods and clarification of the process is needed e.g. were the detections made from isolates or RT-PCR from swabs? This is not clear in the text.
Validity of the findings: This manuscript summarizes AI surveillance efforts in different provinces in China. While the results provided are interesting and conclusions can be drawn that can benefit the prevention strategies currently used, the manuscript needs some work to be of publishable quality
Additional comments: PeerJ #50819
Title: Sequence characteristics and phylogenetic analysis of H9N2 subtype avian influenza A viruses detected from poultry and environment in China, 2018
Authors: Xiaoyi Gao, Naidi Wang, Yuhong Chen, Yuanhui Huang, Xiaoxue Gu, Yang Liu, Fei Jiang, Jie Bai, Lu Qi, Shengpeng Xi , Chuanbin Wang, Yuxiang Shi, Yuliang Liu

This manuscript summarizes AI surveillance efforts in different provinces in China. While the results provided are interesting and conclusions can be drawn that can benefit the prevention strategies currently used, the manuscript needs some work to be of publishable quality. In the materials and methods section, additional methodologies need to be explained. The results need to be discussed in the discussion section rather than in the results section. Some clarification of the surveillance design is also needed. The organization of the figures need to be revised. I suggest adding to the manuscript a clear hypothesis and objectives to give organization to the report.

Abstract

-I would be more specific in the regions where this surveillance strategy occurred.
-Was this active surveillance
-Line 44. Says “salivary acid” and should say “sialic acid”
-Line 45. It would be interesting to say why those genetic variations are important

Introduction

Line 60. This is based on their virulence “in chickens”
Line 63. As stated, you are giving ostriches as an example of wild birds, please correct.
Line 67. Poultry is plural, please change poultries to poultry. Poultry can also be used for a single bird.
Lines 97 to 99. Please rephrase, not understandable on its current form
The introduction is very wide. This introduction should introduce what the manuscript will be covering:
-An active surveillance strategy using HA gene for H9N2 viruses
-and justify why that is done in which region and using which methods.

Materials and methods
Line 111. PBS + AB is not viral transport media, please erase “viral transport media”
Line 113. Not sure which kind of examination needs to be done to the samples but this sentence doesn’t make sense
Table 1. Please eliminate the province column, since the sample nomenclature states the province from where the samples were collected
Line 117 to 135. The fragment size is not reported for HA and NA
line 142. Please eliminate ‘the” to “The GenBank”
Line 144 to 146. Since all AIV’s are hemagglutinating, how can you evaluate antigenicity using HA property? If you use different antibodies to different HA types you could evaluate antigenicity, is that what was done? Please be clearer and add additional data in the way in which the viruses were evaluated on their antigenicity.

Results

Line 149-151. There is a confusion between the tests done during the surveillance. Are the swabs used for RT-PCR, virus isolation, all? Please be clear on the manuscript.
Figure 1 is referenced in the text after figure 2, you need to change the numbering.
Figure 2. The legends seem materials and methods, the legend should explain what the graph is showing and stand alone in terms of explaining what is shown, is there any stats calculation?
The supplementary figure 1 is not included in this document.
Line 157, 161, 199, etc. Were these viruses isolated or detected by molecular biology. If the latter is correct don’t use the word isolation. If they were isolated add the isolation procedure on the materials and methods section and make sure to be clear in reporting.
Line 163. Were nt and aa explained as acronyms before?
Line 169. Supplementary figures were not included in this version of the manuscript
Line 184 to 189. These elements are part of the discussion not result section.
Lines 191 to 193. This seems to be part of the discussion, please change “salivary” to “sialic”
Line 212 to 214. This should be part of the discussion section

Discussion

Line 235 to 236. Please rephrase.
Please clarify the isolation statements.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: SEQUENCE CHARACTERISTICS AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF H9N2 SUBTYPE AVIAN INFLUENZA A VIRUSES DETECTED FROM POULTRY AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN CHINA, 2018
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The continous sampling,testing of birds and poultry and the sequencing of  positive samples are important to prevent and control AIV and to detect new reassortants as early as possible. The continous evolution of AIV should be monitored and the obtained data should be made public.
The manuscript is well written and easy to follow. The outline of the study is well explained. The conclusion drawn from the results are comprehensible.
Experimental design: line 109: "A total of 1529 oropharyngeal and cloacal swab samples were collected."
line 159: "one from environment"
How many environmental samples were tested? No information is found in the material & method part.
line 216-218: Could the authors please state the HI titer values obtained against H9(N2)?
line 219-220: Could the authors please state the HI titer values obtained against H7(N9)?
Validity of the findings: line 291-292: Please discuss whether previous AIV-infections could account for immunity against H5 and H7 Antigens.
Additional comments: The presented mansucript needs some formatting and re-writing.
line 72-73: The authors could also mention H5N6 (Cui et al., 2020; doi.org/10.1080/22221751.2020.1797542)
line 151-152: "83 isolates were detected positive for AIV, and 87.02% (67/77)" - Please state why 6 Isolates were not subtyped? Subytping was not successful?
line 153/216: Fig.2 - Following the text in line 216 - These figure should show the results of the HI assay and not distribution of H7N9, H3N6, H4N6 positive samples. The figure labelling also says:"The samples were collected and detected by RT-PCR. RT-PCR positive samples were
submitted for sequencing, and the sequences were analyzed by BLAST to determine the
subtypes of AIV. Total number of each subtype was shown." - Please rewrite the labelling and the citation in the manuscript.
line 237: "phylogenetic tree in Fig. 2" - Figure 2 does not show a phylogenetic tree
line 264-265: "HA Q234L (H9 numbering) and HA Glutamine (Q) 234
265 lysine (L) (H9 numbering)" - double mentioning of the exact same Mutation
line 296: ideal instead of idea
Tab. 1: the sample number 4 has been used twice whereas number 2 is missing.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: SEQUENCE CHARACTERISTICS AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF H9N2 SUBTYPE AVIAN INFLUENZA A VIRUSES DETECTED FROM POULTRY AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN CHINA, 2018
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: This is the second round of reviews to this paper. The manuscript was considerably improved in quality. However, there re still some issues in phrase construction and english. i would advise authors to look for a native English writer to review and edit the manuscript for clarity in order to take it to publishable quality. I did not see a clear hypothesis and objectives added to this manuscript

Comments:
Line 66. Ostriches are considered domestic poultry unless you refer to wild ostriches. I would either erase that or refer to a larger group.
Line 98. Were inoculated
Line 151. Please revise this sentence “Embryos that died after…”
Line 154. That centrifugation won’t clarify allantoic fluid effectively from blood, that affects the viral titer
Experimental design: Line 154. That centrifugation speed and time won’t clarify allantoic fluid effectively from red blood cells, affecting the viral titer
Validity of the findings: No comments
Additional comments: This is the second round of reviews to this paper. The manuscript was considerably improved in quality. However, there re still some issues in phrase construction and english. i would advise authors to look for a native English writer to review and edit the manuscript for clarity in order to take it to publishable quality. I did not see a clear hypothesis and objectives added to this manuscript


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: SEQUENCE CHARACTERISTICS AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF H9N2 SUBTYPE AVIAN INFLUENZA A VIRUSES DETECTED FROM POULTRY AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN CHINA, 2018
Review round: 3
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Manuscript was greatly improved
Experimental design: ok
Validity of the findings: ok
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: A NOVEL MACHINE LEARNING DERIVED RNA-BINDING PROTEIN GENE–BASED SCORE SYSTEM PREDICTS PROGNOSIS OF HEPATOCELLULAR CARCINOMA PATIENTS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Well written and clearly organized!
Experimental design: The research article falls within the scope of the journal and elucidating the role of RNA binding proteins (RBP's) in Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), a highly malignant aggressive cancer is critical to guide clinical therapy. The basis for selecting the specific microarray datasets instead of the RNA-seq data is not clearly explained. Please elaborate more on the study is based on those datasets. Also, a recent publication on the role of RBP's in HCC using the RNA-seq data from TCGA and the ICGC HCC cohort identified prognosis-related RBPs. And the majority of the pipeline in this study is similar to the published paper on " A novel RNA binding protein-related prognostic signature for hepatocellular carcinoma". Please cite this paper and also add details on how your study is different, and compare the list of RBP's identified from yours to their findings.
Validity of the findings: The provided data is statistically robust, and the findings are linked to the original research question but most parts of the study seem similar to a recently published analysis. Please add on how your study is different from other similar findings.
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: A NOVEL MACHINE LEARNING DERIVED RNA-BINDING PROTEIN GENE–BASED SCORE SYSTEM PREDICTS PROGNOSIS OF HEPATOCELLULAR CARCINOMA PATIENTS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The manuscript entitled ‘A novel machine learning derived RNA-binding protein gene–based score system predicts prognosis of hepatocellular carcinoma patients’ by Zhang et al, is an analysis of the potential use of RNA-binding proteins (RBP) for prognosis of HCC. To this end, the authors used multiple publicly available datasets and extracted HCC-associated RBP genes. Using machine learning algorithms, they created an RBP-score system and found that it was predictive of metastasis, predictive of prognosis among other clinical characteristics. Overall, the manuscript is well written, and findings look robust.

Comments
1.	Authors should cite literature appropriately. E.g Previous work from Wang et al, BMC cancer, 2020 has performed analysis of RBP in HCC. Authors should check the literature and discuss the similarities / differences of the results. Also, Tian et al, Front. Oncol, 2021.
2.	The analysis of copy number variation, somatic mutations, promote region methylation is very crude. Ideally, the reader would like to see some validation. The authors have not clearly pointed out the take home message for this analysis – Figure 2. Besides, in the line 387, authors themselves say that it is not clear whether these contribute any direct changes to expression. Figure 2 may fit supplementary, as it steers the reader from the main message of the story. Thus, authors may think to rearrange the figures.
3.	The authors used multiple datasets. Can they briefly describe in methods / present table to show the type of patients e.g. age or the cancer stage of the patents for the reader to grasp if these datasets were of similar group of patients or if there was a large variability?
4.	Several figures have grammatical errors e.g. in Figure S1.
5.	Line 269, the authors describe the RBP-score, but where are the scores of the gene list provided?
6.	Several references seem missing, e.g. for Roessler metastasis signature, Chen’s six gene signature.
7.	Line 272, Can the authors present the absolute HR values of the all the genes and not just the 10? They may make two categories.
8.	Line 350, nine HCC chosen datasets – what was so special about this choice?
Experimental design: See above
Validity of the findings: See above
Additional comments: See above


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: A NOVEL MACHINE LEARNING DERIVED RNA-BINDING PROTEIN GENE–BASED SCORE SYSTEM PREDICTS PROGNOSIS OF HEPATOCELLULAR CARCINOMA PATIENTS
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: The revised version of the manuscript shows some improvement. Not all errors have been corrected. The Figure S1 has spelling error of microarray. Not corrected.

The new paragraph starting at line 438 has grammatical errors. Moreover, authors have only done technical comparison with previous studies. They have not compared what findings/results were similar / different. This latter part is important for readers to understand what makes the current study an advance.
Experimental design: see above
Validity of the findings: see above
Additional comments: see above


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INHIBITION OF SARS-COV-2 INFECTION IN HUMAN IPSC-DERIVED CARDIOMYOCYTES BY TARGETING THE SIGMA-1 RECEPTOR DISRUPTS CYTOARCHITECTURE AND BEATING
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: The authors examined the effects of selective sigma-1 receptor antagonist NE-100 in iPS-derived human cadiomyocytes. Inhibition of sigma-1 receptor by NE-100 decreased both the number of infected cells and viral particles after 48 hours, and it prevented the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines and cell death. In contrast, NE-100 compromised cytoskeleton integrity by downregulating the expression of structural-related genes and reducing beating frequency.
Experimental design: Fresh human iPSCs-derived cardiomyocytes were used.
Validity of the findings: no comment
Additional comments: In this study, the authors used the selective sigma-1 receptor antagonist NE-100. However, sigma-1 receptor antagonist haloperidol did not show beneficial effects in COVID-19 patients. However, sigma-1 receptor agonists such as fluvoxamine and fluoxetine cause beneficial effects for COVID-19. From the current data, it is unclear whether antagonist or agonist show beneficial effects for COVID-19. Therefore, the additional experiments using the selective sigma-1 receptor agonist (i.e., cutamesine: SA4503) is needed. Cutamesine (SA4503) is available from commercially.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: INHIBITION OF SARS-COV-2 INFECTION IN HUMAN IPSC-DERIVED CARDIOMYOCYTES BY TARGETING THE SIGMA-1 RECEPTOR DISRUPTS CYTOARCHITECTURE AND BEATING
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The paper is clearly written and the methodology detailed (including primer sequences and clone numbers for antibodies) and logical to follow. Permissions for use of clinical samples as well as the work at biosafety level 3 as per WHO guidelines are clearly stated. Results are clearly presented with individual data points in logically presented figures, including western blots (and original uncropped images) with molecular size markers and scale bars on photomicrographs and an excel file is provided containing raw data. Supplementary figures and videos provide further relevant information.
Experimental design: Experiments are well designed and the results presented clearly and logically to the review. Please address the comment below.

Specific comments
1.	Statistical analysis should not be performed on Fig 2D 72h timepoint as the legend indicates n=2.
Validity of the findings: Some findings replicate previous reports, eg SARS-COV2 infection of hiPSC-CMs and the role of S1R (and its potential as a therapeutic target), the role of S1R in cardiomyocyte function and are therefore useful additional data and essentially the manuscript brings these areas of  research together adding to previously reported knowledge but in a relevant cell model for assessing drug responses and drug toxicity. Overall, these findings would be useful to the research community
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: UTILITY OF OLFACTORY IDENTIFICATION TEST FOR SCREENING OF COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTION IN COMMUNITY-DWELLING OLDER ADULTS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: no comment
Experimental design: There have been multiple research published on the olfactory identification and cognitive profile in cognitive impaired individuals. There is no new findings in this study. No meaningful research gap knowledge identified

Confounding factors were not mentioned
Validity of the findings: No novelty
Additional comments: No additional comments


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: UTILITY OF OLFACTORY IDENTIFICATION TEST FOR SCREENING OF COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTION IN COMMUNITY-DWELLING OLDER ADULTS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: I suggest to verify and clarify the following statements:
-"However, the utility of such tests as screening tools for cognitive dysfunction among community-dwelling older people, to our best knowledge, has not been shown yet". It can be considered that there is previous research with community-dwelling older people. Example: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28039314
The present study would nonetheless mantain its relevance.
-"Traditional dementia tests, such as the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) tests, such as the Montreal Cognitive Assessment and Rivermead Behavioral Memory Test, are used to evaluate cognitive function. However, these tests have drawbacks, such as the time required for testing and the high level of specialization of the tests, requiring the expertise of psychologists, making it difficult to implement these tests outside medical settings.". I would not consider MMSE and MoCA to be highly specialized tests, however they do indeed require and benefit from expertise of psychologists.
Experimental design: Please further clarify what is the knowledge/field gap and how the study fills the identified knowledge gap.
Validity of the findings: no comment
Additional comments: The authors provide files pertaining the "documents used to obtain informed consent from participants" and "documents used in the questionnarie". I would suggest to provide english translations if possible.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: UTILITY OF OLFACTORY IDENTIFICATION TEST FOR SCREENING OF COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTION IN COMMUNITY-DWELLING OLDER ADULTS
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: No explanation on the definition of mild, moderate and severe cognitive impairment

Line 89 - Absent of comma error for citation 9,10
Experimental design: Line 145, 146, 147 - The participants were divided into groups:
1. Normal cognitive function (healthy group; 50.2 ≤ MPI ≤ 100)
2. Impaired cognitive function (cognitively impaired group; 0 ≤ MPI ≤ 49.8). For this group, the range is between 0-49.8. The author did not subdivide it to mild, moderate or severe.

Line 149 - Using MMSE, the score ≤23 as indicating the presence of dementia. Were these patients included or excluded from the study
Validity of the findings: Line 197,198,199 - Those (n = 105) with scores of 49.8‒0 (15 males, 90 females; age 78.7 ± 3.7; MPI 39.76, range = 15.55‒49.62), to the cognitively impaired group.
For this statement, no severity of cognitive impairment mentioned

Line 230,231,232 - Discussion
It was not mentioned anywhere in methodology that the study examined the utility of the olfactory identification test as a screening tool for MILD cognitive dysfunction in community-dwelling older people in Japan.
Additional comments: The font used was not standardised throughout the manuscript


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: UTILITY OF OLFACTORY IDENTIFICATION TEST FOR SCREENING OF COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTION IN COMMUNITY-DWELLING OLDER ADULTS
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The manuscript would benefit from small English language editing.
Experimental design: no comment
Validity of the findings: no comment
Additional comments: I would strongly recommend to reconsider the use of the word/concept "race". Please consider that "race" is a social construct, not biological.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: UTILITY OF OLFACTORY IDENTIFICATION TEST FOR SCREENING OF COGNITIVE DYSFUNCTION IN COMMUNITY-DWELLING OLDER ADULTS
Review round: 3
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: No comment comment
Experimental design: no comment comment
Validity of the findings: no comment comment
Additional comments: no comment comment


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: MULTIPLE COMPARISONS OF PRECIPITATION VARIATIONS IN DIFFERENT AREAS USING SIMULTANEOUS CONFIDENCE INTERVALS FOR ALL POSSIBLE RATIOS OF VARIANCES OF SEVERAL ZERO-INFLATED LOGNORMAL MODELS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: The authors clearly state the objectives, methodology and present results in a lucid way.
Overall the quality of the manuscript conform to the standards of PeerJ. However, the novelty of the study is questionable as the authors themselves have published similar kind of studies previously. Hence, the authors need to highlight the research gaps and need for this study. Multiple comparisons across different study areas wouldn't serve the novelty purpose.
Experimental design: Justify with reasons for selecting Bayesian, generalized pivotal quantity and parametric bootstrap approaches for formulating SCI.
Line 79: what "Model" is that?
Table 2: I think the data period seems missing in this table. Mention the dates or week in the table.
Validity of the findings: Discuss the limitations of the GPQ method and the reasons for it.
The results could be further analyzed and reported in the form of text.
Additional comments: Language needs a thorough check. Several typo errors were seen during my review. Example line 106: generalized instead of generalize


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: MULTIPLE COMPARISONS OF PRECIPITATION VARIATIONS IN DIFFERENT AREAS USING SIMULTANEOUS CONFIDENCE INTERVALS FOR ALL POSSIBLE RATIOS OF VARIANCES OF SEVERAL ZERO-INFLATED LOGNORMAL MODELS
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The paper is written well and clear.
Experimental design: The methods were designed correctly and had sufficient information.
Validity of the findings: The new knowledge was proposed in this paper.
Additional comments: There are some comments for improving the paper:
1. The results must be added in the abstract.
2. What is the difference between the zero-inflated lognormal (ZILN) model and the delta-lognormal model? Please add it in the paper.
3. Many formula sentences are not complete (lack of the full stop). See Eqs.(1), (3), (4), (5), (8), (9), (20), (22).
4. In lines 85-89, the symbols   and   are used inconsistency.
5. In Table 5, why do the widths of Bayesian SCIs -based PMB prior and Bayesian SCIs -based RB prior are the same in all pairwise?


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: The project based on the idea to compare isolated duckweed species from natural habitat with high or low light exposures.  The authors selected Lemna minor and Spirodela polyrhiza and tested all isolates under three different light intensities under laboratory conditions. They tested both the increase of the number of fronds as well as the total frond area. This makes it possible to differentiate growth based on the number of fronds and growth based on increase of frond size and to distinguish different growth strategies. The experiments were planned well, the data sound very reliable (straight forward statistics) and the conclusions were well covered by the experimental data. Nevertheless, I am suggesting major revision by the following reasons.
Major critical points:
1. In Figures and Tables the experimental conditions are not well described.
Fig. 1: Which light conditions were used? Do not extend the curves beyond 16 d.
Fig. 2: Instead of “light variant”, the light intensity should be given.  Which data are from which habitat, i.e. shaded and open? I refer in the next point to the calculation of growth rates.
Fig. 3: Which experimental light conditions were used?
Fig. 4: Please, repeat in the legend the calculation of S. The reader must be able to understand the figures without reading the complete text.
Fig. 5: Which experimental light conditions were used?
In general: the legends should describe everything to understand the figure. Similar problems might exist with the tables.
2. Material and Methods
I suggest to give the full Botanical names only here: Spirodela polyrhiza (L.) Schleid. and Lemna minor L. After the full name has been mentioned (perhaps without authority), the names should be given as S. polyrhiza and L. minor  but not by mentioning just the genera.
The capital “M” means mol L-1. In light intensity, the correct dimension is µmol m-2 s-1.
The nutrient medium cited is now called “N medium” in literature. I suggest either using the term or giving the complete composition.
In the formulas, the authors used “log” instead of “ln”. I suggest urgently to change this because it will confuse any reader comparing the growth rates here and in the literature. Moreover, I suggest also urgently to call both rN and rS “relative growth rates”, perhaps qualified by the additional information “based on frond numbers” or “based on frond size”. The abbreviations could be used in the present form. This paragraph could be easier read when the equations are given in separate lines and perhaps numbered. This should be done with rN, rS, delta-r and Send/ Sstart.
The formula to calculate chlorophyll content should be given here.
3. Results
Whereas the statistical evaluation is very sophisticated, I miss the raw data of the results. This might be partially caused by the fact that it is not clear whet is presented in the figures. Perhaps the raw data were given in some of the figures. $Extending the legend might help.
4. Language
I am sorry to give my impression that the language is not always acceptable. I understood never the less everything. I feel obliged to give some examples:
-	Line 22: “due to different resource use strategies than those of small duckweeds”
-	Line 23: In
-	23 “In our study, the resource was light that influenced the plants before and during the laboratory experiment.“
-	Line 48: “by turns”

5. Minor remarks
-  Line 39/40: Lemna minor is not globally distributed – in contrast to S. polyrhiza. Both are finally not native in Europa.
- Line 42: What is meant by fertile? The fertility of the plants does not have an influence on forming mats.
- Line 47: The pockets in Wolffiella and Wolffia are not at the base of the fronds.
- Line 206: Perhaps it is better giving the chlorophyll content in mg
- Line 238-248: The lower light intensity might be easily caused by the fact that continuous white light is often used under laboratory conditions. I would hesitate to call the conditions used in the present project more natural. The bacteria associated with the different duckweed samples from the different places  might have a dramatic influence on performance of the plants.
Line 281-283: Either more details should be provided or cancelled.
- The authors might like to know of a very new review paper covering the whole plant family: Acosta et al. (2021) Return of the Lemnaceae: duckweed as a model plant system in the genomics and postgenomics era. The Plant Cell doi:10.1093/plcell/koab189
Experimental design: See above
Validity of the findings: This is a quite interesting paper for a broad audience
Additional comments: The results are very interesting, the interpretaion is valid - I hope that authors are ready to improve their manuscript follwoing my suggestions.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: 1. The manuscript is clearly written in professional, unambiguous language. If there is a weakness, it is in the statistical analysis (as I have noted above) which should be
improved upon before Acceptance.
Experimental design: 2. What nutrient medium L114 (Hoagland’s or SH or other nutrient medium ) should be list in the manuscript, and what is the concentration of nutrient medium?
3. Lin 123: the experiment was carried out in thermostatic growth room at a temperature of 22oC and lasted 16 days. The difference temperature between day and night can also affect the growth of plants. Why difference temperature between day and night not set in the experimental design?
Validity of the findings: 4. Is there turion produced during the S. polyrhiza cultivation process?
5. The English language should be improved to ensure that an international audience can clearly understand your text. Some examples where the language could be improved.
6. The following references can be cited in the manuscript to support your opinion.
The influence of different plant hormones on biomass and starch accumulation of duckweed: A renewable feedstock for bioethanol production[J]. Renewable Energy, 2019, 138(AUG.):659-665.
The effects of photoperiod and nutrition on duckweed (Landoltia punctata) growth and starch accumulation[J]. INDUSTRIAL CROPS AND PRODUCTS, 2018.
Additional comments: 7. The workload of the article does not seem to be enough for a research manuscript, Protein content, starch content, and Chlorophyll a b and total should be also investigate.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 3

Output:
Basic reporting: The manuscript is not well written, the sentences result often unclear because of their odd structure and there are several grammar mistakes.  I recommend the authors to have the text reviewed by a person more familiar with English language. This is a friendly suggestion, please do not take this comment the wrong way. I am not an English native specker and I’m not stranger to grammar mistakes. I find very helpful to have somebody more proficient than me to proof-read my manuscripts before submission. It saves a lot of timey and gives the paper a higher chance to be accepted.

The results are not completely clear to me, probably just because of a written communication problem.
Experimental design: The work is original and the research question is clear. However, the importance of the study is not stated.  Several experimental flows identified and listed below:

Lines 106-108 - The water surface in the pond is shaded by surrounding trees (shady habitat), while that in the bay is open (open habitat)

Are these evergreen species? Is the pond in low light conditions all the year or just in summer? This is very important. If in spring the pond is at different light conditions, a more opportunistic species could colonise it before shade-tolerant species. The ability to perform well in low-light conditions doesn’t necessarily represent an advantage if the pond is already taken by another species before the leaves of the trees restart their growth. Hence the shadow in summer is not necessarily what drives the compositions of the pond plant communities.

Line 110 Lemna minor and S. polyrhiza co-existed in both sites.

And which one was dominant? Was L. minor dominant in the shadow pond and S. polyrhiza dominant in the open pond? If yes, how did you assess the dominance?

Lines 114 – 115 filled with nutrient medium (Appenroth, Teller & Horn, 1996) and left for four-day-long preculture

Why the authors did not acclimatise the plants to the experimental conditions? Acclimatation is a fundamental step to be sure that the observations are due to the factors tested (in this case light intensity) and not to a stress reaction due to the sudden change of environmental conditions.

Lines 113- 115 Bulk plant material was brought to the laboratory, washed with tap water, placed in containers filled with nutrient medium (Appenroth, Teller & Horn, 1996) and left for four-day-long preculture

This is not clear, did the authors mix the fronds collected from the shadow and from the exposed environment? From lines 119-120 (In total, the number of cups was: 10 repetitions x 2 species x 120 2 sites x 3 light variants = 120.) I understand that both species, collected in both locations, were tested at all the three light intensities. If this is what you did, I agree with your methodology, but I do not see all these treatments showed in the results.

Lines 123 - 124The experiment was carried out in thermostatic growth room at a temperature of 22oC

What was the temperature of the ponds where the plants were collected? Since the plants were not acclimated to the experimental conditions, this information is very important. The two sites are very likely to differ in water temperature. Without acclimation you cannot exclude that the observations are due to the shock for sudden change in temperature.

Line 121 PPFD: 1 – 125, 2 – 236 and 3 – 459 µmol photons m–2 s–1 .

Why the authors did not test a very high light intensity, like the one measured in the exposed waterbody? The highest light intensity tested is still not really high and the tested lights are not very far away from each other.

Lines 131-134.

I see from the supplementary file that the biomass was also weighted. Why it is not shown in the results and why it was not used to calculate other interesting parameters?  Light affects the thickness of the fronds. The total area of the fronds can’t, alone, be used to assess a strategy. Some species could reduce the fronds size, but produce thicker fronds. A complete morphological analyses should include Leaf Area Ratio (LAR). Net Assimilation Rate (NAR) also helps to understand the species strategy. In my opinion, the area and number of fronds alone are not sufficient to draw conclusions
Validity of the findings: I am not convinced of the validity of the findings as the plants, collected in different environments, were not acclimated to the experimental conditions.
Additional comments: Results
Lines 170 -171 Spirodela fronds grew and multiplicated slower at high light intensity

What Spirodela? The one collected from the shade of from the open habitat?

Lines 163 – 164 Univariate F tests 164 revealed that both species grew and reproduced fastest at medium light intensity

 Is this valid for both plants collected from the shade and  from the open habitat? Please specify.

Discussion
Lines 244 – 245 We showed that light conditions in the habitat of species origin affected the reproduction rate and thereby our findings confirm that the rate reflects the adaptation of clones to local conditions

How can the authors be sure that what they observed is adaptation and not acclimation?

Figure 1 Increasing number of fronds during experiment fitted to the exponential model. Data represent plants from the shady habitat grown at low light intensity (n = 10).

Please show also the results for plants collected in the exposed habitat

Figure 2 The growth and reproduction rates of Lemna minor and Spirodela polyrhiza from both habitats at different light intensities.

I don’t understand, from this caption I get that I should see for graphs: Growth rate and rate of reproduction for plants collected from low light environment and for plants collected from exposed environment.

 Why only two graphs are shown? And what plants are these?

Figure 3, 4 and 5

Same comment as above, please show all the results. It’s not clear whether there is a difference between plants collected from low light environment and for plants collected from exposed environment.

Supplementary table is not very clear, please label better the columns. Also, why there are 4 light intensities (0, 1, 2, and 3)?


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: The authors considered very carefully my suggestions and responded in a proper way. That they preferred to give the full Botanical name not in M&M but at the place of firts metioning is a matter of tast. I do not have a problem with it. I read also the response to teh other two reviewers and after that I suggest to accept the manuscript in the resent form.
Experimental design: Reveiwed in the original version - no problem
Validity of the findings: Reviewe din the original version - no problem
Additional comments: I suggest accepting the manuscript in the present form


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: no
Experimental design: no
Validity of the findings: no
Additional comments: no


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: LIGHT INTENSITY DRIVES DIFFERENT GROWTH STRATEGIES IN TWO DUCKWEED SPECIES: LEMNA MINOR L. AND SPIRODELA POLYRHIZA (L.) SCHLEIDEN
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 3

Output:
Basic reporting: The language is strongly improved in this new version. Comparisons with studies that examined effect of light on these two species are strongly recommended. The Landolt book (Landolt, 1986. Biosystematic Investigations in the Family of Duckweeds (Lemnaceae), Vol. 2. Veroffent. Geobot. Inst. Eidg. Hochschule, Stift, Riubel, Zurich.) should have a section about effect of light on duckweed species.
The non-significant results were not included in the supplementary material, the authors only shared the results of the statistical tests. I am not convinced that the results of the study support the conclusion that Spirodela is better adapted to shady conditions.
Experimental design: As I highlighted before, the study is original and the research question is interesting and well defined. However there are two weaknesses in the experimental design: 1) lack of acclimation of the plants to the experimental conditions 2) Narrow range of light intensities tested. In particular, the authors did not test the performance of these species at high light intensitie (more than 800 micromol/m/sec).
Validity of the findings: Because of the weaknesses in the experimental design reported above, I am not convinced about the validity of the findings. I believe that if the authors are not willing to repeat the experiment they should change the conclusions and aknowledge clearly the limitations of the study. The authors stated in the respons to my comment that they agree with my doubts:
''We agree with the Reviewer’s doubts as to the possibility of far-reaching conclusions. The text has been modified in the line 259.'' But they didn't really address the matter in the discussion.
Additional comments: Answers to authors' answers

'The pond is surrounded by mixed, not evergreen forest (oak, maple, lime, pine trees). The first frond of duckweeds appear there at the same time as leaves on trees (the end of May). Therefore, shading is a factor operating for almost the whole growing season.'

This is a statement very difficult to prove. Moreover, I don’t see changes in your text that address this matter.

'there was no difference in the proportion of surface area occupied by the two species between open and shady habitats.'

Doesn’t this disprove your conclusions ‘Our results […]suggest that under shaded conditions, S. polyrhiza is likely to achieve an advantage over L. minor’ ??

'We acclimatised plants for 4 days at medium light intensity. Longer preculture periods would give us subsequent generations of fronds increasingly distant from natural conditions.'

I don’t understand, so you are testing acclimation, not adaptation?  if you conclude that Spirodela performs better in shady environments because of its growth strategy, you are implying that it’s a genetic trait that determines the better performance at low light. If you don’t pre-adapt the plants to the experimental conditions, you can’t say that the better performance is due to its strategy, you can only conclude that plants acclimated (not adapted! Adaptation means that natural selection played a role in it and determined genetic traits that give the plant the ability to perform better in certain conditions) to shady conditions perform better in shady conditions. I strongly suggest repeating the experiment with plants acclimated to the experimental conditions.

'Light intensity measured in the open habitat was the highest possible on a sunny day. On cloudy and/or rainy days, the intensity of light was closer to our high experimental treatment.'

This doesn’t really convince me. Both sunny and cloudy days are present in real environmental conditions, the range of light intensities tested is not representative of the real one, you didn’t test high light conditions, so you don’t know how the two species behave when high intensities are present. This is a limitation that must be acknowledged in the manuscript.'

We agree with the Reviewer’s doubts as to the possibility of far-reaching conclusions. The text has been modified in the line 259.

I only see this: (however, see caveats raised by Ziegler et al., 2015). Which, in my opinion, is not enough to acknowledge the limitations due to lack of acclimation to experimental conditions.

M&M
Please add references for the equations used (rN = (lnNt – lnN0)/t, rS = (lnSt – lnS0)/16).

Discussion

Lines 259-260 this rate reflects the adaptation of clones to local conditions (however, see caveats raised by Ziegler et al., 2015).'
I disagree with the use of the term 'adaptation'. Also, here the authors should discuss properly the limitation of their study.

Conclusions

Lines 305-306 Lemna minor from the shady habitat enhanced light harvest by increasing chlorophyll a
concentration, but did not invest more in frond enlargement than L. minor from the open habitat.

The second species should be Spirorela

Lines 309-310 [...] suggest that under shaded conditions S. polyrhiza is likely to achieve an advantage over L. minor.

This is in contrast with your statement that Spirodela was not dominant in the shady site.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: PALATAL MUCOSA THICKNESS AND PALATAL NEUROVASCULAR BUNDLE POSITION EVALUATION BY CONE-BEAM COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY—RETROSPECTIVE STUDY ON RELATIONSHIPS WITH PALATAL VAULT ANATOMY
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Everything is correct and follows the recent indications in this regard.

Bibliography should be formatted respecting the journal’s requirements and no improper citations are evidenced.
Experimental design: Everything is correct and follows the recent indications in this regard.

•	“Measurements were performed with Kodak Dental Imaging Software (Eastman Kodak, Rochester NY, USA) on DICOM files obtained from CBCT. PMT was measured from midpalatal of premolar and molar teeth on cross-sections.” I ask the authors to better explain how the measurements were standardized, a real critical point in this type of investigation.
Validity of the findings: excellent research and with interesting results.
Additional comments: The paper is a clinical research on the relationships with palatal vault anatomy and palatal mucosa thickness and palatal neurovascular bundle position evaluation by cone-beam computed tomography.

The Authors made a great work in terms of methodology and the paper sounds scientific and well written.

However, some improvements are mandatory before acceptance.
The abstract summarizes correctly and carefully what will be developed in the article, is precise and relevant, and divided into different categories that make it easily readable.
 In the Introduction:
•	“Other methods used for measuring PMT are the use of ultrasound or cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT). The difficulty of using ultrasound is that it is difficult to find probes in sizes suitable for oral use and equipment calibration is difficult (Eger, Muller & Heinecke, 1996).” It is also possible, remaining in the radiation free exams, to consider the possibility of studying this aspect with an MRI exam for dental use. Although the limitations are important, more and more evidence regarding the application of this technique can be found in the literature, even up to guided implant planning. and citing this article:

“In the context of implant surgery, magnetic resonance imaging allows for the detailed measurement of mucosal thickness and can aid in the planning of palatal tissue harvesting to obtain soft tissue augmentation” from  “Reda R, Zanza A, Mazzoni A, et al. An Update of the Possible Applications of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) in Dentistry: A Literature Review. J Imaging. 2021 Apr 21;7(5):75. doi: 10.3390/jimaging7050075.”

•	“Although CBCT is recommended for detailed examination of hard tissues in the maxillofacial complex rather than soft tissues, it has been reported that CBCT can also be used for imaging dentogingival soft tissues with studies conducted in last years (Scarfe, Farman & Sukovic, 2006; Song et al, 2008; Borges et al, 2015).” Not only that, recent evidence in the literature underlines how modern CBCT devices assisted by new software, allow to obtain extremely valid results also in the study of skin soft tissues, assisted by the superimposition of DICOM data with extraoral photos of the patient, both for complex implant rehabilitations -prosthetics that oer the 3D planning of orthodontic treatment, as underlined in this two article that I suggest to enrich the introduction from this point of view:

“Alhammadi MS, Al-Mashraqi AA, Alnami RH, et al. Accuracy and Reproducibility of Facial Measurements of Digital Photographs and Wrapped Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) Photographs. Diagnostics (Basel). 2021 Apr 23;11(5):757. doi: 10.3390/diagnostics11050757.”

“Perrotti G, Baccaglione G, Clauser T, et al. Total Face Approach (TFA) 3D Cephalometry and Superimposition in Orthognathic Surgery: Evaluation of the Vertical Dimensions in a Consecutive Series. Methods Protoc. 2021 May 18;4(2):36. doi: 10.3390/mps4020036.”
In Materials and Methods section:

•	“Measurements were performed with Kodak Dental Imaging Software (Eastman Kodak, Rochester NY, USA) on DICOM files obtained from CBCT. PMT was measured from midpalatal of premolar and molar teeth on cross-sections.” I ask the authors to better explain how the measurements were standardized, a real critical point in this type of investigation.
Results are easy to understand and comprehensive. All the studied characteristics were reported in tables which are clear and concise.
In the Discussion:

•	“Differences between epithelium, fat and connective tissue cannot be seen in CBCT images.” to return to the previous evaluation, instead these characteristics can be visualized on the MRI.
The overall is comprehensive, concise and complete in its various aspects.
Conclusions are concise and clear.
Bibliography should be formatted respecting the journal’s requirements and no improper citations are evidenced.

Figures and labels are clear and easy to comprehend.

English is clear and easy to understand.
-
1. Basic Reporting Ѵ
2. Experimental design Ѵ
3. Validity of the findings Ѵ

4. General comments
The Authors made a great work in terms of methodology and the paper sounds scientific and well written.
However, some improvements are mandatory before acceptance.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: PALATAL MUCOSA THICKNESS AND PALATAL NEUROVASCULAR BUNDLE POSITION EVALUATION BY CONE-BEAM COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY—RETROSPECTIVE STUDY ON RELATIONSHIPS WITH PALATAL VAULT ANATOMY
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: References must be reformatted and coul be improved in order to complete the background of the research.
Experimental design: ok
Validity of the findings: ok
Additional comments: ALL COMMENTS ARE LISTED IN THE ATTACCHED PDF FILE
Plagiarism has been checked and a low acceptable level was detected.
References must be formatted according to the journal’s guidelines
Some minor spell checks are required.

The research has been scientifically conducted and the manuscript has been well written. However, some improvements are mandatory before acceptance.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: PALATAL MUCOSA THICKNESS AND PALATAL NEUROVASCULAR BUNDLE POSITION EVALUATION BY CONE-BEAM COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY—RETROSPECTIVE STUDY ON RELATIONSHIPS WITH PALATAL VAULT ANATOMY
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: I think the article is now suitable for publication.
Experimental design: I think the article is now suitable for publication.
Validity of the findings: I think the article is now suitable for publication.
Additional comments: I think the article is now suitable for publication.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: PALATAL MUCOSA THICKNESS AND PALATAL NEUROVASCULAR BUNDLE POSITION EVALUATION BY CONE-BEAM COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY—RETROSPECTIVE STUDY ON RELATIONSHIPS WITH PALATAL VAULT ANATOMY
Review round: 2
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: ok
Experimental design: ok
Validity of the findings: ok
Additional comments: In my opinion the manuscript can be accepted for publication.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: METHODOLOGICAL RECOMMENDATIONS FOR ASSESSING SCLERACTINIAN AND OCTOCORAL RECRUITMENT TO SETTLEMENT TILES
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 1

Output:
Basic reporting: Please see my comments in the comments for authors.
Experimental design: Please see my comments in the comments for authors.
Validity of the findings: Please see my comments in the comments for authors.
Additional comments: This study examined the annual recruits of both hard and soft corals for three years at 30 sites along the Florida Reef Tract. While the study design is good and the scale of this study using a total of 2880 tiles at 30 sites over three years is large, the purpose of this study is not well-stated at the introduction and hence not clear. Especially I confused when I read the conclusion of this manuscript that focuses on the methodological aspect of this study, recommending to use corallite count, because the study design appears to be created for an ecological survey on the recruitment pattern of hard and soft corals, not for the assessment of counting methods. As the main finding (?) of higher number of corallites than live recruits is not surprising, I think it’s more meaningful to focus on the recruitment pattern of hard and soft corals found in this study. Because of this confusion I can see in the current manuscript, my recommendation on the manuscript is “major revision”. Please see below comments for improving your manuscript.

<comments>

Introduction
In the final paragraph of introduction, please state the purpose of this study. You can state them clearly here, conduct appropriate analyses to examine the purposes, and discuss them in the discussion. Any analyses and discussions that do not match with the purpose should be removed from the manuscript as they create confusion.

Materials and methods
In the paragraph of GLM; there are several GLMs employed in the analysis. However, the current descriptions on each GLM is not clear enough and confusing. Please clearly describe each GLM in this paragraph; What variables were used as a response variable, fixed factors, and covariate factors; What statistical distribution was used for each response variable with what ling function?
In the model, you should nest the groups of tiles deployed along the same permanent transect. So there are four tile groups at each site.
Year (2016, 2017, 2018) should be included as a fixed factor in the GLMs for hard coral recruits. I noticed that you did this for soft coral recruits and you should do the same for hard coral recruits.

Results
The statistical test used here should not be called “ANOVA (analysis of variance)”. It should be called “analysis of deviance” when you examined statistical significance using GLMs.
In the Fig. 1, and Table 3 and 4, water depth of site was categorized to 5, 10, 15m in Fig. 1 and >10m vs <10m in the tables. As you have the exact depth data and you use GLMs, it’s no point to create this rough categorization. In Fig.1, you can use a color gradation to show the exact depth. In the analyses on the depth effect, you can use GLMs to examine using the original depth data, not using the rough two depth categories.
I’d like to suggest to include some more analyses as you have a good dataset that allow you to examine. (1) where did the coral recruits settle on the plate surface (micro-habitat); on the exposed plate area or inside the groove?
(2) The data of live recruits vs dead recruits (only corallites) can be used to estimate post-settlement survival pattern. You can examine the effect of depth, orientation of plate surface (top vs bottom), micro-habitat on the plate surface (exposed area vs inside grooves) and the interaction of depth x surface orientation on the proportion of live vs dead.

Discussion
The 2nd paragraph; Here you discuss the unique pattern of coral recruits on top vs bottom tile surfaces along depth gradient in this study. I think it’s interesting to examine the effect of coral taxa (family) on this pattern, as this pattern might be created by different settlement patterns of recruits among the dominant coral taxa (family). Is there the depth effect on the number of recruits in each coral family? Is there any difference in the pattern of shift from top to bottom or bottom to top among the coral taxa? To analyze this, you can create a GLM for the proportion of recruits on the top surface with “coral taxa”, “depth”, and the interaction term Coral taxa x Depth as fixed factors.
Line 215; you said that “we found most (67%) octocoral recruits on tile top”, without good statistical evidence. It’s only in 2018 and no difference in the other two years. Rewrite the discussion of this paragraph.
Line 239-242; I think the purpose of live scan and corallite scan is different. So if you include advantage and disadvantage of each census method in recommendation, it would be better.

Figure and tables
Fig. 1; can you match the information between Fig. 1 and Table 1? For example, you can use the same site id number in both Fig. 1 and Table 1.
Table 2; Year needs to be considered as a fixed factor.
Table 3 and 4; It’s better to use the exact water depth using GLMs than the two depth categories. You can present the result as a regression figure with water depth for the x-axis and response variable for the y-axis.
Table 6; Why water depth was not included in this analysis? The same full analysis for hard coral recruits should be done for octocoral recruits.

Supplementary data
Th site lists; depth needs to use the unit, meters. What does the site number in the first column mean?
The format of dates in the time line file in supplementary varies and need to unify the style.
Those supplementary files need to be self-explanatory, but many labels of variables might need to have explanations. As you provide Table 1, and overlapping information in some supplementary files needs to be removed.


Instruction: You are one of the reviewers, your task is to write a review for the article. You will be given the title of the article, the number of the round in which the article is located, and your order among the reviewers.

Input:
Title: METHODOLOGICAL RECOMMENDATIONS FOR ASSESSING SCLERACTINIAN AND OCTOCORAL RECRUITMENT TO SETTLEMENT TILES
Review round: 1
Reviewer: 2

Output:
Basic reporting: The manuscript is well written and follow a standard organisation. The introduction highlights well the need of the study, the figures are well designed and clear (but see comment for the captions), and references are wisely used when needed. Regarding data accessibility, all data and code is provided in the supplementary.
Experimental design: The authors deployed and analyzed an impressive number of recruiting tiles across a large number of sites. The authors compared the count of recruits with and without treatment. They also compared the count on the top and bottom surface of the tiles for scleractinians and octocorals. The study was repeated across three years.
Congrats to the authors for the hard work.
Such large deployment of recruiting tiles is rare and the lack of comparision between the different methods of assessing recruits (from the type of tiles deployed, ie different rugosity, to the method used to count recruits) makes difficult or even prone to misinterpretations previous studies. This study aimed at filling this gap and provide important information for the information of past findings and for future work.
Validity of the findings: The experiment is well replicated, the statistics are adequate and the results (mostly) support the conclusions.

My only comments is the interpretations of the results regarding the prevalence of recruits on the top rather than on the bottom surface of the tile, as this conclusion seems to be supported mostly by the results obtained in 2018 and not so much by the results obtained in 2016 and 2017. I would appreciate if the authors could provide a more detailed explanation of their generalization as this is a main discussion points. It also suggests that previous studies may have underestimated coral recruitment. Following this result, the author then argue that previous studies could have found larger recruit counts on the bottom surface because of its higher rugosity and that here they found a different result as they controlled for rugosity. This result is therefore important and the difference found across years should, in my opinion, be discussed.
Additional comments: Methods:

line 94 : distance between nearest tiles was 1~10m. Please provide in addition the length of the different transects and perhaps the mean distance among tiles.

Results:
line 156: "The interactions between scan method and tile surface was significant". It is difficult to understand the interaction from Figure 3 and this result is not discussed. Perhaps it would be better to use Tukey groups to denotes the difference across top and bottom count too. Generally, it seems that the difference between corallite scan and live scan was greater on the top of the tile (correct me if I am wrong). Do you think it is because the surface of the tile is more prone to biofouling and sedimentation that would have hide the recruits?

Discussion
line 193: The author states and this is an important point of the paper, that most scleractinians recruits were found on the top surface of the tiles. But this seems to be especially true in 2018, and not really in the other years. Similarly for the octocorals, the difference is not really pronounced except for 2018 (the only one that is significant).
The number of scleractinians recruits is also the highest in 2018 and this could explain the large percentage of recruits found on the top of the surface. The authors should therefore discussed why 2018 show this high recruitment and why they generalize that recruits are found in higher number on the tile surface (contrary to other studies) regardless of the results obtained in 2016 and 2017.
line 210:  it sounds as if you suggest that Rogers et al. overestimated the Agariciids proportion of coral recruits? Is that correct? Are there other studies that either support Rogers et al. conclusions or yours? (sorry I don't have access to that paper now)

Figures:

Figure 3: The caption is confusing in my opinion as I was not sure to  which data point you refer to. Perhaps better to simply describe the figure as  "boxplots of the mean densities of recruits at each study site".

Figure 4: same comments as above