Dynamic Modeling for Prediction of Amino Acid Requirements in Broiler Diets
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsComments and Suggestions for Authors
After reviewing the manuscript entitled “Dynamic Modeling for Prediction of Amino Acid Requirements in Broiler Diets”, the following suggestions were made it:
Abstract
Line 14: Authors should describe at least briefly the main characteristics of the animals used in the experiment, such as breed or genetic line, sex, average age and weight, rearing conditions, and treatments evaluated.
Lines 14-20: The description should be improved by adding the significance values ​​with which the presence or absence of significant effects was detected.
Line 21: Authors should add a clear hypothesis at the end of the abstract.
Keywords: amino acid requirement, broiler. These words used as keyword is the same as those previously used in the title of the manuscript. Keywords should be different from those in the title (but related to the topic) to broaden the reach of academic search engines in case the manuscript is later published.
Introduction
Lines 29-33: Authors should specify under which feeding conditions amino acids are a limiting nutrient.
Lines 34-36: Are there scientific references that justify these statements?
Lines 51-54: Are there scientific references that justify these statements? Because they are not commonly used methods, all information related to them must be adequately justified.
Lines 55-56: These lines should be deleted.
Line 57: Authors should add a clear hypothesis before the objective of the study.
Material and methods
Lines 66-73: Authors should specify the number of replicates per treatment and the duration of the experimental period.
Lines 85-87: Feeding schedule must be specified.
Lines 124-135: Scientific references should be added to adequately justify the methods and procedures used in these evaluations.
Lines 138-171: Statistical analyses were performed and described correctly.
Results
Line 174: Please change “presents” to “shows”.
Lines 174-182: The description of the results needs to be changed and improved because in its current form it is too repetitive and unclear.
Line 183: The title of this Table should be more specific and contain the animal species evaluated and the treatment assessed (for example, amino acids).
Line 186: You must describe what each of the treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of.
Lines 190-194: The description of the results needs to be changed and improved because in its current form it is too repetitive and unclear. Likewise, the significance value with which the presence or absence of significant effects was detected must be added.
Line 195: The title of this Table should be more specific and contain the animal species evaluated and the treatment assessed (for example, amino acids).
Line 198: Subtitles should not contain abbreviations, please type AA's full name.
Line 203: The title of this Table should be more specific and contain the animal species evaluated and the treatment assessed (for example, amino acids). Table titles should not contain abbreviations, please write the full name of AA.
Line 205: Subtitles should not contain abbreviations, please type AA's full name.
Lines 206-213: The description of the results needs to be changed and improved because in its current form it is too repetitive and unclear. Likewise, the significance value with which the presence or absence of significant effects was detected must be added.
Line 231: The title of this Table should be modified because it should not contain abbreviations or equations. Also, all abbreviations used within the Table must be defined in the Table footer.
Line 232: The title of this Table should be more specific and contain the animal species evaluated and the treatment assessed (for example, amino acids). Table titles should not contain abbreviations, please write the full name of AA.
Line 240: The title of this Table should be more specific and contain the animal species evaluated and the treatment assessed (for example, amino acids). Table titles should not contain abbreviations, please write the full name of AA. Also, all abbreviations used within the Table must be defined in the Table footer.
Discussion
Lines 243-252: These lines should be removed and replaced with a proper discussion because, in their current form, only the advantages of the method are discussed, and the current study did not compare methods.
Line 252: Why did you use BW0.666? Please justify any use of coefficients with original and appropriate scientific references.
Line 260: Please add the values ​​for those ranges of threonine and lysine requirements.
Lines 263-264: Please add the valine values ​​reported in those previous studies so that the reader understands the magnitude of the change from the current study.
Lines 266-272: Are there scientific references to support these claims? Please provide adequate justification for any hypothesis raised.
Lines 278-280: Are there scientific references to support these claims? Please provide adequate justification for any hypothesis raised.
Lines 282-322: Overall, the discussion presented by the authors is correct. However, it is necessary to discuss the biological importance of each of the amino acids evaluated for adequate growth and metabolism in modern broiler chickens.
Conclusions
Lines 323-329: The conclusion drawn by the authors is consistent with the title, objectives, and results of the manuscript. Please only delete lines 323 and 324.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thanks for your comments and suggestions, we really appreciate that, please look into detailed in attached file.
Kind regards,
Guangju
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsSpecific comments to authors.
Page: 2
Line 71. Include the characteristics of the climate-controlled enclosures such as brand and model and the environmental settings such as temperature, light, and humidity.
Table 1. Improve the title so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easily understood what it is about. In its current form, it does not correctly describe its content or what type of animals it is about. In the footnote briefly include what treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of.
Page:3
Table 2. Improve the title so that if the verbiage is extracted from the document it is easily understood what it is about. In its current form, it does not correctly describe its content or what type of animals it is about. In the footnote briefly include what treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of.
Page: 5
Une 144. Correct the format of the citation (Zhao, 2023).
Page:6
Table 4. It is not clear. The arrangement of rows and columns and their content is clumsy and needs to be re-organized. In addition, the title should be improved so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easy to understand what it is about. In its current form, it does not correctly describe its content. The term "Gender" is incorrectly located. Include the "Treatments" column to define what the letters A, B, C, D, and E in the table are about. Also, briefly include in the footnote what the treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of.
Table 3. Delete the probability values ​​P-value in the last line of the table since the footnote already specifies it.
Line 188. Please review the term "within a row", perhaps you meant "within a column"
Line 192. Each time the authors mention statistical differences in the text, they should add the Probability Value P< or P> as appropriate.
Table 4. Improve the title so that, if the table is extracted from the document, it is easily understood what it is about. In its current form, it does not correctly describe its content.
Page:7
Line 200. Add the probability values ​​in the text for age, gender, and diet.
Table 5. Improve the title of the table, so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easy to understand what it is about. The title is clumsily worded and is not very descriptive. Do not use the abbreviation AA in the title but the full term. Replace the term item as well.
Lines 206 and 207. The predictive model was already mentioned in materials and methods. Delete the sentence 'Our predictive model... AA growth'.
Page:8
Lines 206 to 214. The wording of the Results should be revised and reformulated. In its current form, it is confusing.
Lines 216 to 226. The mention of the models is not results but corresponds to materials and methods.
Lines 227 to 230. It is necessary for the authors to describe the results of Tables 7 and 8. Not just mention them.
Table 6. Improve the title so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easily understood what it is about. In addition, it is recommended that the equation be removed from the title and placed in a footnote.
Table 7. Improve the title so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easily understood what it is about. The authors not only included males but also included females.
Page: 10
Table a. The table should be improved. Improve the title so that if the table is extracted from the document it is easily understood what it is about. Extracts the table from the document to make it easy to understand what it is about. The term Gender should be placed in a better way in the table. In the second column, there are several superscripts on the terms "Predictions", "NRC", "BTPS" and "Arbor Acres manual", although there are no references to these superscripts. Also, you should check the term "Predictions" for AA Methionine. You are advised to include the NRC values ​​in each column, regardless of whether the same value is repeated between weeks so that the values ​​are displayed uniformly.
Lines 243 to 246. Delete this paragraph that does not contribute to the discussion or send it to the introduction section, where it may be more appropriate.
Lines 248 to 255. Delete this useless text "The factorial model... broiler chickens" as it does not contribute to the discussion. The discussion should focus on comparing the results obtained with other authors or against the assumptions of the hypothesis and will try to find a plausible explanation for the findings found.
Line 249. The maintenance
Page: 11
Line 288 to 289. Check that the authors did not have changes in the environmental conditions, but used boxes with controlled environments.
Lines 292 to 295. Delete or rephrase the text "Studies have shown ... PRf X AAf" since the way it is worded corresponds to materials and methods.
Page: 12
Lines 31 1 to 312. The sentence "This aligns with evidence that broiler breeders have been selectively bred for rapid growth, which increases their metabolic and nutritional requirements" should include a supporting literature reference.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thanks for your comments and suggestions, we really appreciate that, please look into detail in attached file.
Kind regards,
Guangju Wang
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis is a very well written manuscript that tackles an issue that is for long a topic of debate whether we are formulating feeds according to the needs to the modern broiler breeds.
Despite the clarity of the exposition, and the reviewer does believe in what authors say, it would be nice to see table 5 split into the treatments and gender to confirm what authors claim, but also to help other researchers use the data of the authors in meta-studies. the same remark for table 6.
table 7 has a title 'AA requirement prediction analysis of male broilers". first it is a pity that this is not given per AA. Second from where does the requirement values come from and the content in the diet columns; this was not clear tot he reviewer.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for your valuable comments and suggestions. We sincerely appreciate your input. After careful revision and reorganization, we have detailed the specific adjustments in the manuscript. To your concerned about table 7, thank you for pointing this out, this is a mistake, we have corrected this table. Thanks again for your efforts.
Kind regards,
Guangju Wang
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsComments on the Paper: agriculture-3326564-peer-review-v3
Title: Dynamic Modeling for Prediction of Amino Acid Requirements in Broiler Diets
General Comments:
The authors have adequately addressed most of the feedback provided. However, there are a few minor issues that could enhance the manuscript further.
Specific Comments:
Page 3:
Tables 1 and 2: The titles need improvement as they are currently incomplete. Please specify that these diets are intended for broiler chickens aged 15 to 21 days.
Tables 1, 2, and 3 - Footnote: Please include a brief description of what treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of. This clarification will aid the reader's understanding. For example, “Diet A was formulated based on the Brazilian Tables for Poultry (2011). The protein levels in diets B and D were reduced by 1.69% and 3.38%, respectively, compared to diet A, with proportional decreases in amino acid levels. Conversely, the protein levels in diets C and E were also reduced by 1.69% and 3.38%, respectively, compared to diet A, but their amino acid levels remained equivalent to those in diet A.”
Page 7:
Table 3 - Footnote: Use letter superscripts a, b, and c.
Page 8:
Table 4: Please remove the probability P-values from the last column. Instead, include a footnote stating that no differences were detected among the effects tested at P > 0.05.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for your review and detailed comments. We agreed with your opinion, and all issues has been revised. please see our response below.
Comments1:
Page 3:
Tables 1 and 2: The titles need improvement as they are currently incomplete. Please specify that these diets are intended for broiler chickens aged 15 to 21 days.
Tables 1, 2, and 3 - Footnote: Please include a brief description of what treatments A, B, C, D, and E consist of. This clarification will aid the reader's understanding. For example, “Diet A was formulated based on the Brazilian Tables for Poultry (2011). The protein levels in diets B and D were reduced by 1.69% and 3.38%, respectively, compared to diet A, with proportional decreases in amino acid levels. Conversely, the protein levels in diets C and E were also reduced by 1.69% and 3.38%, respectively, compared to diet A, but their amino acid levels remained equivalent to those in diet A.”
Response: Thanks for pointing these issues out, we added the broilers and the treatment information. In addition to that, we specified the treatments detailed principles in table footnote, please look at Table 1 and 2 (Page 3, 4).
Comment 2:
Page 7:
Table 3 - Footnote: Use letter superscripts a, b, and c.
Response: Thanks, we have replaced them as their superscript form. Please look at Table 3 (Page 7).
Comment 3:
Page 8:
Table 4: Please remove the probability P-values from the last column. Instead, include a footnote stating that no differences were detected among the effects tested at P > 0.05.
Response: We have removed that column, and include that statement. Now, it more reasonable and clear, thanks! Please look at Table 4 (Page 7).
Thanks for your efforts again! All the best with your work!
Kind regards,
Guangju Wang
