New ozone–nitrogen model shows early senescence onset is the primary cause of ozone-induced reduction in grain quality of wheat

Cook, Jo; Brewster, Clare; Hayes, Felicity; Booth, Nathan; Bland, Sam; Pande, Pritha; Thankappan, Samarthia; Pleijel, Håkan; Emberson, Lisa

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-21-4809-2024

Articles | Volume 21, issue 21

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-21-4809-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Special issue:

Tropospheric Ozone Assessment Report Phase II (TOAR-II) Community...

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-21-4809-2024

© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 21, issue 21

Research article

|

05 Nov 2024

Research article |

| 05 Nov 2024

New ozone–nitrogen model shows early senescence onset is the primary cause of ozone-induced reduction in grain quality of wheat

Jo Cook, Clare Brewster, Felicity Hayes, Nathan Booth, Sam Bland, Pritha Pande, Samarthia Thankappan, Håkan Pleijel, and Lisa Emberson

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Final revised paper (published on 05 Nov 2024)
Supplement to the final revised paper
Preprint (discussion started on 14 May 2024)
Supplement to the preprint

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

CC1:
'Comment on egusphere-2024-1311', Owen Cooper, 01 Jul 2024

My comments can be found in the attached pdf.

Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-CC1
- AC1: 'Reply on CC1', Jo Cook, 16 Sep 2024
  
  Response to editors comments are in the attached pdf
  
  Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-AC1
RC1:
'Comment on egusphere-2024-1311', Stefano Galmarini, 17 Jul 2024

The comment was uploaded in the form of a supplement: https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2024/egusphere-2024-1311/egusphere-2024-1311-RC1-supplement.pdf

Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-RC1
- AC2: 'Reply on RC1', Jo Cook, 16 Sep 2024
  
  Replies to reviewer comments are in the attached pdf
  
  Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-AC2
RC2:
'Comment on egusphere-2024-1311', Anonymous Referee #2, 31 Jul 2024

Cook and others incorporate a new model meant to explicitly simulate the impact of ozone on plant nitrogen dynamics and apply it to wheat trials. The results are interesting with a nice and defensible finding that stay green varieties are likely to minimize ozone impacts, which tend to hasten senescence. The manuscript could benefit from a number of adjustments that would make it easier to read and more concise.

The abstract was rather terse and did not enumerate particular findings, quantitatively, that make the study unique.

Please edit the manuscript for flow and redundancies: note for example ‘Northern India’ is used twice in 28-29.

The narrative is tied to the FAO’s sustainable development goals, but ozone impacts to wheat is important regardless and becomes a bit of a distraction because the purpose of the manuscript stands alone: the importance of ozone to wheat yield and productivity.

Note usage errors like the rogue period on line 52.

67: ‘possess the capacity to’ -> ‘can’. Emphasis on removing all unnecessary words and phrases will make the manuscript more succinct and impactful.

Eq 1 and elsewhere: don’t use the star in formal mathematical equations for multiplication, it has too many meanings (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterisk#Mathematics)

Table 1: just note in the legend that the parameters are unitless. There are also probably too many significant digits given realistic uncertainties.

What do the lightning bolts mean in figure 3?

320: ’that they were varied’ -> ‘between which they were varied’?

In Figure 4 and elsewhere, why do the ’simulated’ variables have no uncertainty estimates?

345 and elsewhere: a time series figure of yield for different years could help the reader understand some of the variability involved.

The Discussion makes some interesting points and is nice and upfront about the things that the model still struggles with. It could benefit from a bit more brevity if possible.

I like the schematics, also in the appendix, that highlight what equations correspond to different processes.

Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-RC2
- AC3: 'Reply on RC2', Jo Cook, 16 Sep 2024
  
  Response to reviewer comments are in the attached pdf
  
  Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1311-AC3

Peer review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision | EF: Editorial file upload

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (16 Sep 2024) by Paul Stoy

ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (16 Sep 2024) by Paul Stoy (Co-editor-in-chief)

AR by Jo Cook on behalf of the Authors (18 Sep 2024) Author's response Author's tracked changes Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (18 Sep 2024) by Paul Stoy

ED: Publish as is (18 Sep 2024) by Paul Stoy (Co-editor-in-chief)

AR by Jo Cook on behalf of the Authors (19 Sep 2024)

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Short summary

At ground level, the air pollutant ozone (O₃) damages wheat yield and quality. We modified the DO₃SE-Crop model to simulate O₃ effects on wheat quality and identified onset of leaf death as the key process affecting wheat quality upon O₃exposure. This aligns with expectations, as the onset of leaf death aids nutrient transfer from leaves to grains. Breeders should prioritize wheat varieties resistant to protein loss from delayed leaf death, to maintain yield and quality under O₃exposure.