Peer Review History
Original SubmissionJuly 10, 2024 |
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PONE-D-24-28380Properties of stingless bees (Meliponula beccarii) honey in Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa zone, EthiopiaPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Begna, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Sep 09 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
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Please include a copy of Table 2 which you refer to in your text on page 21 (in PDF format). [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: No ********** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: N/A Reviewer #3: Yes ********** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: Yes ********** 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: No ********** 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: General about the paper: This study investigates the physicochemical properties of honey produced by the underground nesting stingless bee (Meliponula beccarii) in the Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa, Ethiopia. By analyzing 24 honey samples, the research highlights significant findings such as low hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) levels, high acidity, and low pH, which indicate the honey's freshness and potential medicinal benefits but not specifically mention its medicinal properties. Main differences with its in glucose, acidity, moisture content, and pH between the two districts suggesting the honey's unique qualities between 2 places, Honey produced by M. beccarii is valuable for the traditional medicine BUT no data presented in this study, and warranting further investigation. Methods: Why do you choose these two location? any reason? And please mark clearly on the MAP, showing specific coordinate. Is the sample collected from wild or any private company running the Collection business? RESULTS a) Make sure name of genus and species in italics. b) Table 1 and sections 3.1 to 3.6 must be properly Tabulated. Make sure unit numbers standard. It will be easier to compare to the paper published by Nordin et al., (2018) about Stingless bee data (Codex alimnetarius standard for normal sting Bee; we do not have standard for Stingless Bee,). c) Please discuss the unique findings of data found in your two honeys comparing to others. This not properly highlight in this section. Conclusion: Please improve this section taking consideration of improvement from the Resulst/Discussion. Reviewer #2: Title 1. Title should be modified? It say properties of stingless bee, what properties? There are a lot of properties. Please specify that properties 2. It is not necessary to write Title: Properties of stingless bees (Meliponula beccarii) honey in Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa zone, Ethiopia. Starting by name of the article title is possible 3. I strongly recommend the authors if follow the journal formatting guidelines starting from Title formatting to Reference writing since the manuscript didn’t prepared based on the journal guidelines 4 .correct affiliation and corresponding author according to journal formatting guidelines Abstact 5. Be careful for terminology of the parameter. For example free acidity not acidity , electrical Conductivity not electric conductivity 6.put correct standard unit for each parameter in abstract .example free acidity (meq/ Kg) not mill./kg, mS/cm not ms/cm 7. put SI for moisture content 8. I recommend ash content not mineral . 9. “The distinctive low HMF, high acidity and low pH values of the stingless bee honey of this study may represent freshness and good quality of the honey and indicative medicinal potential” . I didn ’t think high acidity indicate fresheness of honey, in this conntarst high acidity indicate fermentation rate of honey . the free acidity of obtained in this extremely high as compared to previous study conducted in west shoa and other parts of the country ,this need strong justification .may be during sample collecton orr harvesting mixing sample with soil,pollen ,and other dead and imputirtes cause honey to be fermented and high acidity 10.” This study evaluated physicho-chemical properties of honey produced by ground nesting stingless bee (Meliponula beccarii) in two districts of West Shewa zone,” this is redundant since the author mentioned in firstyt line of abstract .please remove and re –edit again 11.what cause your study unique since different study was reported in west shoa. Introduction 11.please folloew journal juideline starting from heading , 12. reference citation is in number form for this journal. 13 .The name of Meliponula beccarii must be in italized form 14. if damma daamu local name it must be in italic form 15. Previous work and limitation /gap on characterization of stingless bee honey in that area as well as in Ethiopia must be clearly indicated 16. Paragraph arrangement of the introduction is not good Materials and method 17. I recommend if there is sub heading under materials and methods section, unless this arrangement confuse the reader 18. Figure 2, especially on the bottle containing sample is not visible, remove or replace with good picture Result and discussion 19. on the result obtained on the free acidity , I strongly doubt on the result obtained (338.79 ± 72.46) . what is reason behind extremely high free acidity , is soil and other impurities is mixed in to honey during honey collection or harvesting .the author must discuss and compare with other data in Ethiopia. 20. I recommend the author also to compare the result with standard stingless bee honey in other countries (like brazil,venzuala and etc.) ,please refer there is standard of stingless bee honey in other country.) 21. Under acidity section , the author mentioned that sample was purchased .However they didn’t mentioned in methodology part . Sample collection should clearly indicated under methodology part otherwise it confuse the reader 22. CORRECT 3.1 Acidity to Free acidity 23. The overall mean moisture content of the 24 stingless bee honey samples was 23.45-36.75% is not good sentence .rewrite again 24.Table 1 should be come after paragraph of free acidity . 25.The paragraph arrangement is not good .it must be justified . 26. This finding is consistent with previous studies. Gela et al. (2021) reported an overall pH range of 3.4-3.9 (mean 3.7±0.15) for stingless bee honey from four districts in Ethiopia. Remove full stop between studies and Gela. 27 . The standard pH value for Apis mellifera honey is 3.42–6.10 (Tesfaye et al., 2016). Are you sure with sentence or statement. In my opinion, 6.10 is not standard value of pH . Be sure also the citation .revise again. 28 . what your sample size . under materials and method s the author mentioned that 24 sample was collected .But on the table 1 the author stated that the sample size(N)=27. Which one is correct? It need revision 29 . Put acronomy for all abbreviation found in the table. 30. The way of data presentation is not good for this article. I recommend the authors to use standard table or journal guidelines. Additionally, I recommend to put the result by mean ± std with mean separation letters .I observe level of significance in body of manuscript .but there is no in a table .How?. Please rewrite again. 30. 3.3 Mineral (ash) contents correct to Ash content only remove mineral 31. Under 3.3. I recommend the authors to start the paragraph by presenting the result not discussion with literature .Remove first sentence 32. M.beccarii should be in italic form in all manuscript 33.Be carefull when reporting the facts .for example “The higher mineral content of the stingless bee honey from the Dandi and Meta Robi districts indicates that it may be a better choice for both medicinal and nutritional purposes, provided that the honey is properly standardize” . I don’t think so that higher mineral content indicate medicinal value of honey .Rather there is parameters that indicate medicinal and nutritional value of honey. Please revise and cite the above sentence. 34. under 3.4 Sugar profile need more discussion and citation . Not enough now. Compare current result with standards of stingless bee honey in other country. 35. under 3.5 plesae start the paragragh by mentioning the obtained result .discussion come after presenting the finding. 36. In this study, 0.06 and 4.2.0 values were recorded as minimum and maximum. 4.2.0 correct this one. 37 . Please use style uniform typing for et al . in some areas it is in italic form and in some areas it is non- italic Conclusion 38 . how high free acidity related to potentiality of medicinal value . 39. In conclusion I need a finding related both source of sample collected results Reviewer #3: Reviewer report of the Manuscript ID PONE-D-24-28380 Congratulations on the present study! It is an interesting work with relevant data, but it is a preliminary analysis and I do not know if it is more suitable for a short report or research note than a full-length study. However, it is an Editor's decision and several improvements must be realized by the authors in the revised version of the manuscript. General comments The manuscript is well-written, and, in my opinion, no major English Editing is needed. However, all sections need to be organized, especially the Abstract, Material and methods, and Conclusion sections. Also, the scientific names are incorrectly put in non-italic form. Figures needed to be further elaborated. Please see my minor comments below. Minor comments Abstract Please rectify “The differences between the two districts honey samples are significant (p> 0.05) in glucose value”. The p-value is not significant. Please put all names of “A.mellifera” due to being first mentioned. Introduction Please rectify “(Apis)” by putting all scientific microbial names in italics. Also, check the remaining text for this error. Material and methods Please correct Figure 1, it is a print screen still with red underlines. Please clarify: “From each nest, fresh honey samples ranging from 0.25 to 0.5 liters were collected” but in the abstract, the authors stated “A total of 24 honey samples with each 0.58–0.69-liter were collected”. The Material and methods section shows no clear division of the techniques applied. Please reorganize this section with proper subsections and cite all procedures applied. Results and discussion Table 1- Please clarify: “Mean physicochemical properties of stingless bee honey samples (N = 27)” but the authors previously stated 24 honey samples or 24 stingless bee nests in the Abstract and Material and methods sections. Purchased honey samples must be added in the Abstract section, I already saw that these purchased honey samples were described in the Material and methods section, but improvements are needed in both sections. Conclusion Please add the shortcomings of the present study. References Please revise all citations. For example: 11. hilmi, M., & Martin hilmi. (2005). The Marketing of bee products. 12. Kahraman. (2010). Physico-chemical properties in honey from different regions of Turkey. .." FOOD CHEMISTRY, 123(1), 41–44 24. Quality and Standards Authority of Ethiopia (QSAE). (2005). Honey Specification: Ethiopian Standard, ES 1202. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 28. Stramm, K. M. (2011). Composition and Quality of Honey Bee Jandaira (Melipona Subnitida), Storage Effects and Comparison with Apis mellifera Honey. 29. Teferi Damto, D. K. and M. (2022). Physico-chemical and microbiological characteristics of honey produced by stingless bees. Among others. Again, congratulations on the present work! Best regards ********** 6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: Yes: Fahrul Huyop Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No ********** [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.
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Revision 1 |
PONE-D-24-28380R1Physicochemicalproperties of stingless bees (meliponula beccarii) honey in Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa zone, EthiopiaPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Begna, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Oct 18 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Tzen-Yuh Chiang Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: (No Response) Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Partly Reviewer #2: Partly ********** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: MINOR CORRECTIONS: Please highlight these changes in RED/BLUE in your corrected manusucript a) Introduction Section: Please include a brief mention of Meliponula beccarii as an important stingless bee species in Ethiopia, with appropriate references. Highlight that this species is commonly found in the Dandi and Meta Robi districts of the West Shewa zone, Ethiopia. b) Results and Discussion Section: (i) Figure 2: The current image of the water bottle is not ideal. We need to clearly see the color of the honey (green/yellow/dark). Please describe the color more clearly and replace the image with a better one. (ii) Please be cautious with the phrase “to indicate medicinal value of honey.” It would be more appropriate to say: “indicate the medicinal and nutritional value of honey.” Kindly check and revise this. (iii) The discussion on the sugar profile needs further elaboration and additional citations (Please compare with other findings the data from Stingless Bee as well). The comparison with the Codex Alimentarius standard is very appropriate maintain as it is, BUT should also include comparisons with stingless bee honey from other regions like Southeast Asia (Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand) and South America- Brazil/Venezuela etc.. I recommend comparing your results with the standards for stingless bee honey from other countries. Please refer to existing standards for stingless bee honey in these regions (IF ANY). Others are OK! Reviewer #2: Abstract 1. Check maltose content result because it is extremely high .compare with other findings 2.Again I inform the authors that high acidity (Free acidity) is not related with quality and medicinal properties .High acidity of stingless bee related to fermentation rate of this honey because stingless bee honey contain high moisture and alcohol is easily formed in it .that is way free acidity is high. High quality and medicinal properties of stingless bee is related to strong pH and high antioxidant properties. 3. The result of turanose was not presented in abstract Materials and methods Results and Discussion 4. Please free acidity more acceptable than acidity on sub heading 5. The authors stated that free acidity was extremely high in this study and also mentioned this is because of different species and agro ecologies. But since different study was conducted in West Shoa as the author stated in introduction, why you don’t compare you’re finding with those study conducted in same area and same country. The study lack literature discussion in Ethiopia. Or high acidity because of your sample impurity? Please discuss carefully on the finding. I didn’t see improvement. 6. The line and paragraph spacing and font color is not uniform in all paragraph 7. Correct sub heading of moisture content 8. Font color and size of sub heading should be improved 9. In abstract the authors stated elevated pH value but in results and discussion parts, the finding of the study is similar with other finding conducted in Ethiopia. Revise abstract or discussion parts. 10. The arrangement of the paragraph is week 11. For me discussion of sugar profile is not enough? Needs to be revised again by comparing the finding of the study with other similar findings. 12. Under HMF paragraph please correct the paragraph 13. Why fresh collected and marketed ones was not compared in finding. It is better if both types of samples was compared parallel. Conclusion 14.“This study evaluated This study evaluated “. Please remove redundant sentence 15.” This study evaluated the physicochemical properties of honey produced by the ground-nesting stingless bee (Meliponula beccarii) in Ethiopia” , by collecting sample from two woreda of Oromia region we can say this study represent Ethiopia. Please revise this one again. 15 .revise the conclusion based on your fining especially on fresh and marketed honey sample variability 16. lack of consistent formatting of reference ********** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: Yes: Fahrul Huyop Reviewer #2: No ********** [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. |
Revision 2 |
PONE-D-24-28380R2Physicochemicalproperties of stingless bees (meliponula beccarii) honey in Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa zone, EthiopiaPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Begna, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Oct 26 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Tzen-Yuh Chiang Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: Author addressed all comments. Reviewer #2: The author must be use the some font colour in throughout the paragraph .Ialso reccomend the author to revise manuscript in paragragh arregement ********** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: Yes: Fahrul Huyop Reviewer #2: No ********** [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.
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Revision 3 |
Physicochemicalproperties of stingless bees (meliponula beccarii) honey in Dandi and Meta Robi districts of West Shewa zone, Ethiopia PONE-D-24-28380R3 Dear Dr. Begna, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice will be generated when your article is formally accepted. Please note, if your institution has a publishing partnership with PLOS and your article meets the relevant criteria, all or part of your publication costs will be covered. Please make sure your user information is up-to-date by logging into Editorial Manager at Editorial Manager® and clicking the ‘Update My Information' link at the top of the page. If you have any questions relating to publication charges, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, Tzen-Yuh Chiang Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed ********** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes ********** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes ********** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes ********** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes ********** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: All comments addressed by author ********** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: Yes: Fahrul Huyop ********** |
Formally Accepted |
PONE-D-24-28380R3 PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Begna, I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now being handed over to our production team. At this stage, our production department will prepare your paper for publication. This includes ensuring the following: * All references, tables, and figures are properly cited * All relevant supporting information is included in the manuscript submission, * There are no issues that prevent the paper from being properly typeset If revisions are needed, the production department will contact you directly to resolve them. If no revisions are needed, you will receive an email when the publication date has been set. At this time, we do not offer pre-publication proofs to authors during production of the accepted work. Please keep in mind that we are working through a large volume of accepted articles, so please give us a few weeks to review your paper and let you know the next and final steps. Lastly, if your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at customercare@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Tzen-Yuh Chiang Academic Editor PLOS ONE |
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