brycewang-stanford Revision & Rebuttal (est-revision-and-rebuttal)
An ES&T major/minor revision is a real opening, but acceptance depends on satisfying typically three expert reviewers and the editor. Environmental-science reviews tend to demand concrete analytical fixes — more QA/QC, a closed mass balance, added controls, clearer significance — so the response letter must answer each with evidence, not assurances.
When to trigger
- A revision decision arrived and you are planning the revision + response letter
- Reviewers disagree and you must reconcile their demands
- A reviewer requests new experiments, controls, or analyses
- Writing the cover note to the editor summarizing the revision
Strategy
- Read the editor's letter as the rubric. The editor signals which points are decisive — solve those first; the editor adjudicates disagreements among reviewers.
- One point-by-point response, every comment addressed. Quote each comment, then respond. Never skip one — silence reads as non-compliance.
- Concede or rebut with evidence. Did what was asked (cite the new text/figure/table/SI location), or push back respectfully with a reason (data, mechanism, or environmental relevance). A well-argued disagreement beats a hollow capitulation that weakens the paper.
- Answer analytical asks concretely. Add the requested control/replicate, report the recovery or detection limit, close the mass balance, or run the alternative analysis — and show the result.
- Reconcile conflicting reviewers openly. When reviewers want opposite things, say so, choose a principled path, and explain the tradeoff to the editor.
- Protect the contribution. Add robustness and clarity; resist changes that dilute the environmental-significance claim; defend scope conditions rather than over-claiming.
- Keep SI and deposit in sync. Update the Supporting Information, data-availability statement,
and deposited data/code so new exhibits remain reproducible (see
est-reporting-and-reproducibility).
Response-letter format
For each reviewer comment:
> [Quoted reviewer comment]
Response: [What we did / why we respectfully disagree].
Change: [Section/page/figure-table/SI location where the revision appears].
Open with a short summary of the main changes to the editor; group by reviewer; end each entry with the location of every change so the editor can verify quickly.
Triaging ES&T reviewer asks: concede, add, or defend
Environmental-science reviews cluster into recognizable demands. Decide the response mode per type so the letter reads as evidence, not assurance:
| Reviewer ask | Default response mode | What to show |
|---|---|---|
| "Report detection limits / QA/QC" | concede + add to SI | the blank/recovery/LOD table |
| "Mass balance doesn't close" | concede or bound | closure % and the named missing fraction |
| "Environmental relevance unclear" | defend with framing | tie concentrations/matrix to the real system |
| "Add a control/replicate" | add if feasible | the new result, in a figure/table |
| "Reanalyze censored data" | add | ROS/MLE result vs. original |
| "Conditions unrealistic" | defend or scope | justify, or narrow the claim |
Worked micro-example (illustrative — answering a QA/QC pushback)
A reviewer on the PFAS-fate paper writes (illustrative): "The transformation claim is unconvincing without recovery and blank data; precursor loss could be sorption." A response that converts the reviewer:
> The transformation claim is unconvincing without recovery and blank data;
> precursor loss could be sorption.
Response: We agree QA/QC was under-reported and that sorption is a competing
explanation. We now report matrix-spike recovery (92±7%, n=6) and field blanks
(<LOQ) in Table S3, and we add an abiotic (autoclaved) control showing <5%
precursor loss (illustrative), ruling out sorption/abiotic pathways as the
dominant sink. The downstream PFHxA increase therefore reflects biotransformation.
Change: Methods p.6; new Figure 3b; Tables S3 and S5; data and code updated on
Zenodo (DOI: illustrative).
The pattern that wins: name the competing explanation the reviewer raised, kill it with a control and reported numbers, and point to the exact location — never promise the fix in prose alone.
Anti-patterns
- Ignoring or merging away a comment without a visible response
- Promising a fix in prose without showing the new data/exhibit
- Capitulating to a request that breaks the paper's logic just to please a reviewer
- Defensive or dismissive tone toward reviewers
- New exhibits that drift out of sync with the SI and deposited data
Output format
【Editor's decisive points】addressed first? [list]
【Coverage】every reviewer comment answered? [Y/N]
【Concede vs rebut】each tagged with evidence + change location
【Analytical asks】controls/QA-QC/mass balance addressed with results? [Y/N]
【Reviewer conflicts】reconciled and explained to editor? [Y/N]
【Contribution protected】significance not diluted? [Y/N]
【SI + deposit updated】[Y/N]
【Next】resubmit via the ACS Publishing Center
Supplementary resources
../../resources/external_tools.md— analysis/QA-QC tools for reviewer-requested additions../../resources/official-source-map.md— decision flow and editor-discretion policy