Foliar Application of Gibberellin Alleviates Adverse Impacts of Drought Stress and Improves Growth, Physiological and Biochemical Attributes of Canola (Brassica napus L.)
, Muhammad Zubair Ishaq 4, Hafiz Munir Ahmed 5, Sajid Mehmood 6, Muhammad Imtiaz 7, Umer Farooq 4, Muhammad Rashid 1 and Allah Ditta 8,9,*
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Authors.
Although there is a good effort in the empirical work but there are some comments concerning this empirical paper that may enhance it:
1. What are the research hypotheses?
2. There is no sources under Table 1.
3. There are no sources under Figures 1- 6.
4. The description should be immediately before the figure or table.
5. There is no explanation of the meaning of the symbol * under table 1.
6. Discussion should be as a separate issue in the article.
7. The Conclusions contains only 4 lines. It must be extended and must respond to the set goals and research hypotheses.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 1 Comments
Dear Authors.
Although there is a good effort in the empirical work but there are some comments concerning this empirical paper that may enhance it:
Response: Thanks for your appreciation. We have improved our manuscript as per the suggestion of the worthy reviewer
Comment: What are the research hypotheses?
Response: The research hypothesis was already written (Please see lines 73-74)
Comment: There is no sources under Table 1.
Response: The sources under Table 1 have been explained
Comment: There are no sources under Figures 1- 6.
Response: Data source was added in article line number 107:108. (Data Source: https://power.larc.nasa.gov, Latitude: 30.268, Longitude: 71.5020)
Comment: The description should be immediately before the figure or table.
Response: The figure number has been corrected and their description has been made immediately
Comment: There is no explanation of the meaning of the symbol * under table 1.
Response: The explanation of the meaning of the symbol *, **, and ns has been added in the caption of Table 1
Comment: Discussion should be as a separate issue in the article.
Response: We have improved the discussion of our results by highlighting the responsible mechanisms
Comment: The Conclusions contains only 4 lines. It must be extended and must respond to the set goals and research hypotheses.
Response: The conclusion section has been improved as per the suggestion of the reviewer
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Elahi et al. studied Foliar Application of Gibberellin Alleviates Adverse Impacts of Drought Stress and Improvements Growth, Physiological and Biochemical Attributes of Canola (Brasilia Napus L.). The manuscript has certain novelty, but the following problems need to be revised:
(1) Check all abbreviations in the manuscript carefully to ensure their consistency.
(2) In line 88 of page 2, it is recommended to add the full name of the abbreviated form EC.
(3) This manuscript aims to explore the potential of gibberellic acid (GA3) in the alleviation of drought stress in canola. Three levels of GA3 (G0 = 0 mg L−1, G1 = 100 mg L−1, and G2 = 150 mg L−1) were applied to the leaves of two canola varieties (Punjab canola and Faisal canola) under two drought stress conditions (D1 for three days of drought stress and D2 for six days of drought stress). Although the amount of data is huge, the research contents and methods are slightly monotonous.
(4) The content of the conclusion part is very few, and some content can be added to enrich it.
(5) Please carefully check whether the “Figure X” mentioned in the manuscript corresponds to the Figure X. As mentioned in lines 164-165 on page 5, “FC showed a decrease in NSPP that was 9.83 at 6D stress and with no application of GA (Figure 3).” The contents shown in Figure 3 do not mention the indicators of NSPP, while Figure 2 refers to this contents.
(6) As shown in Figure 2, under 150 mg L−1 of PC, the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 6D stress decreased compared with that under treatment of 3D stress. However, under the condition of 150 mg L−1 FC, the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 3D stress was increased compared with the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 6D stress. Please give a reasonable explanation for this phenomenon.
(7) The choice of keywords is not reasonable enough.
(8) Introduction is not attractive, so it is suggested that the author should improve it to some extent.
(9) The resolution of the picture in the manuscript is too low.
(10) The conclusions part is not profound and comprehensive enough.
(11) The language of the manuscript needs great improvement.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 2 Comments
Elahi et al. studied Foliar Application of Gibberellin Alleviates Adverse Impacts of Drought Stress and Improvements Growth, Physiological and Biochemical Attributes of Canola (Brasilia Napus L.). The manuscript has a certain novelty, but the following problems need to be revised:
Response: Thanks for your appreciation. We have revised our manuscript as per the suggestions of the worthy reviewer
Comment 1: Check all abbreviations in the manuscript carefully to ensure their consistency.
Response: All abbreviations were checked and corrected
Comment 2: In line 88 of page 2, it is recommended to add the full name of the abbreviated form EC.
Response: Full name was added (Electrical conductivity (EC)).
Comment 3: This manuscript aims to explore the potential of gibberellic acid (GA3) in the alleviation of drought stress in canola. Three levels of GA3 (G0 = 0 mg L−1, G1 = 100 mg L−1, and G2 = 150 mg L−1) were applied to the leaves of two canola varieties (Punjab canola and Faisal canola) under two drought stress conditions (D1 for three days of drought stress and D2 for six days of drought stress). Although the amount of data is huge, the research contents and methods are slightly monotonous.
Response: Thanks for your comment. We have tried our level best to make the research contents and methods lively and clear.
Comment 4: The content of the conclusion part is very few, and some content can be added to enrich it.
Response: The conclusion section has been revised accordingly
Comment 5: Please carefully check whether the “Figure X” mentioned in the manuscript corresponds to the Figure X. As mentioned in lines 164-165 on page 5, “FC showed a decrease in NSPP that was 9.83 at 6D stress and with no application of GA (Figure 3).” The contents shown in Figure 3 do not mention the indicators of NSPP, while Figure 2 refers to this contents.
Response: Thanks for your comment. The figure number has been corrected accordingly
Comment 6: As shown in Figure 2, under 150 mg L−1 of PC, the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 6D stress decreased compared with that under treatment of 3D stress. However, under the condition of 150 mg L−1 FC, the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 3D stress was increased compared with the plant height (PH) value under treatment of 6D stress. Please give a reasonable explanation for this phenomenon.
Response: We have modified the statement by adding a reasonable explanation for this phenomenon (Please see lines 159-163)
Comment 7: The choice of keywords is not reasonable enough.
Response: We have revised the keywords as per the suggestion of the reviewer
Comment 8: Introduction is not attractive, so it is suggested that the author should improve it to some extent.
Response: We have revised the Introduction section as per the suggestion of the reviewer
Comment 9: The resolution of the picture in the manuscript is too low.
Response: We have improved the resolution of all the Figures as much as possible
Comment 10: The conclusions part is not profound and comprehensive enough.
Response: The conclusion section has been revised accordingly
Comment 11: The language of the manuscript needs great improvement.
Response: We have gone through the whole manuscript and corrected any typos and grammatical mistakes
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript considered the influence of gibberellin on canola under drought stress conditions. I have some questions and remarks:
(1) The description of application of gibberellins in agriculture should be extended including variants of treatment, research objects, practical significance of this treatment and other.
(2) The mechanisms of influence of gibberellins on plants should be extended.
(3) The description of soil analysis should be extended including description of instruments, procedure of measurement and other.
(4) The procedure of measurement of temperature, precipitation, relative humidity should be described.
(5) The description of procedure of preparation of data collection should be extended. The description of brand of instruments should be added.
(6) The description of abbreviations should be added for all tables and figures.
(7) The discussion is speculative because content of abscisic acid and reactive oxygen species were not measured.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 3 Comments
The manuscript considered the influence of gibberellin on canola under drought stress conditions. I have some questions and remarks:
(1) The description of application of gibberellins in agriculture should be extended including variants of treatment, research objects, practical significance of this treatment and other.
Response: We have given the mentioned details in the abstract, Introduction, and conclusion sections and highlighted
(2) The mechanisms of influence of gibberellins on plants should be extended.
Response: We have discussed the mechanisms of influence of gibberellins on plants in the Introduction as well as in the discussion sections
(3) The description of soil analysis should be extended including description of instruments, procedure of measurement and other.
Response: We have added the description of soil analysis in more detailed
(4) The procedure of measurement of temperature, precipitation, relative humidity should be described.
Response: The data source has been mentioned
(5) The description of procedure of preparation of data collection should be extended. The description of brand of instruments should be added.
Response: We have extended the description of the procedure of preparation of data collection and also the brand of the instrument
(6) The description of abbreviations should be added for all tables and figures.
Response: We have added the description of abbreviations for all tables and figures
(7) The discussion is speculative because content of abscisic acid and reactive oxygen species were not measured.
Response: We agree with the reviewer that the contents of abscisic acid and reactive oxygen species were not measured in the present study. However, we have recorded other physiological parameters such as chlorophyll contents, carotenoids, relative water contents, and protein contents which are also good indicators of abiotic stress tolerance in plants [1-4].
- Faseela, P., Sinisha, A.K., Brestič, M. and Puthur, J.T., 2019. Chlorophyll a fluorescence parameters as indicators of a particular abiotic stress in rice. Photosynthetica, 57(SI), pp.108-115.
- Na, Y.W., Jeong, H.J., Lee, S.Y., Choi, H.G., Kim, S.H. and Rho, I.R., 2014. Chlorophyll fluorescence as a diagnostic tool for abiotic stress tolerance in wild and cultivated strawberry species. Horticulture, Environment, and Biotechnology, 55(4), pp.280-286.
- Anjum, N.A., Sofo, A., Scopa, A., Roychoudhury, A., Gill, S.S., Iqbal, M., Lukatkin, A.S., Pereira, E., Duarte, A.C. and Ahmad, I., 2015. Lipids and proteins—major targets of oxidative modifications in abiotic stressed plants. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 22(6), pp.4099-4121.
- Grote, D., Schmidt, R. and Claussen, W., 2006. Water uptake and proline index as indicators of predisposition in tomato plants to Phytophthora nicotianae infection as influenced by abiotic stresses. Physiological and molecular plant pathology, 69(4-6), pp.121-130.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
I have read the revised version of the Manuscript and found that the authors have taken into accounts the concerns that I raised. Thus I recommend it for publication.
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript has been improved. I don't have other questions.
