Review History


All reviews of published articles are made public. This includes manuscript files, peer review comments, author rebuttals and revised materials. Note: This was optional for articles submitted before 13 February 2023.

Peer reviewers are encouraged (but not required) to provide their names to the authors when submitting their peer review. If they agree to provide their name, then their personal profile page will reflect a public acknowledgment that they performed a review (even if the article is rejected). If the article is accepted, then reviewers who provided their name will be associated with the article itself.

View examples of open peer review.

Summary

  • The initial submission of this article was received on April 8th, 2025 and was peer-reviewed by 3 reviewers and the Academic Editor.
  • The Academic Editor made their initial decision on July 1st, 2025.
  • The first revision was submitted on August 19th, 2025 and was reviewed by 1 reviewer and the Academic Editor.
  • The article was Accepted by the Academic Editor on October 10th, 2025.

Version 0.2 (accepted)

· · Academic Editor

Accept

Thank you for your valuable contributions and for addressing the reviewers' comments.

[# PeerJ Staff Note - this decision was reviewed and approved by Xiangjie Kong, a PeerJ Section Editor covering this Section #]

Reviewer 2 ·

Basic reporting

This paper has been revised very well

Experimental design

-

Validity of the findings

-

Cite this review as

Version 0.1 (original submission)

· · Academic Editor

Major Revisions

**PeerJ Staff Note:** Please ensure that all review, editorial, and staff comments are addressed in a response letter and that any edits or clarifications mentioned in the letter are also inserted into the revised manuscript where appropriate.

**Language Note:** The review process has identified that the English language must be improved. PeerJ can provide language editing services - please contact us at [email protected] for pricing (be sure to provide your manuscript number and title). Alternatively, you should make your own arrangements to improve the language quality and provide details in your response letter. – PeerJ Staff

Reviewer 1 ·

Basic reporting

The authors provide an adequate literature review that establishes the importance of corn reserve management and the need to identify storage years accurately. The introduction effectively frames the research gap that this study aims to address.

However, some sentences could be improved with more careful proofreading. For example, repeated use of the "not only... but also..." structure in consecutive sentences.

Experimental design

-

Validity of the findings

The findings are well-supported by the experimental data. However, the stability of the model under different sample conditions should be discussed further.

Additional comments

1. The authors' multiple samples were taken from each corn year to reduce measurement bias. The authors systematically evaluated different preprocessing combinations.

2. References are appropriate and current, and they cover prior work in seed vitality, spectral analysis, and model design.

Cite this review as

Reviewer 2 ·

Basic reporting

Identifying the year of maize seeds using Raman spectroscopy technology is very helpful for improving production efficiency.

Experimental design

inadequate

Validity of the findings

Not Clear

Additional comments

This paper uses Raman spectroscopy combined with chemometric methods to identify the year of maize seeds, which is an interesting study. However, this paper lacks innovation, as the methods employed have been extensively reported in previous studies. Additionally, the authors have not clearly specified the maize varieties and sample sizes used in their study. Overall, the author's experimental design and conclusion have flaws that are insufficient to support the publication of this paper.

Cite this review as

·

Basic reporting

The introduction was fine, but you need to add references to support it. Also, mention how your work is different from the existing studies.

Experimental design

Details regarding the experimental setup are missing. Also, the number of scans performed for each sample or the total size of the dataset used was also missing.

Validity of the findings

Please add spectra that have details of where the changes are obtained for different groups.

Additional comments

Dear Authors,

Thank you for submitting your article for review. Your manuscript details a study exploring the feasibility of combining Raman spectroscopy with machine learning for corn year identification, which is an interesting area of research.

To help strengthen your submission, please consider addressing the following points:

1. Supporting References: Please provide appropriate citations for the information presented in lines 42-58 to substantiate your descriptions.

2. Novelty of Work: Clearly articulate the unique contributions and novelty of your research. What sets your work apart from existing studies in this field?

3. Experimental Details (Instruments and Data Collection): In the "Instruments and Data Collection" section, please provide more specific details regarding the experimental setup. This should include the number of scans performed for each sample or the total size of the dataset used.

4. Figure Quality: We recommend enhancing the visual quality of all figures to improve their clarity and readability.

5. Raman Spectroscopy Analysis Details: In the "Preparation and Analysis of Raman Spectroscopy" section, specify the particular peaks or wave ranges that were utilized for classifying the different corn years.

6. Misclassification in Figure 6: Could you please provide an explanation for the observed misclassifications among the different groups in Figure 6? Understanding the potential reasons for these discrepancies would be beneficial.

7. Spectral Differences Graph: To further support your conclusions, please include at least one graph that visually represents the spectral differences between the corn samples from various years.

All text and materials provided via this peer-review history page are made available under a Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.