User talk:Masashi Nakatani-1
The review entitled "Vibrissal mechanoreceptors" written by Dr. S. Ebara, T. Furuta and K. Kumamoto is well-written and extensive literature to overview the recent findings in whisker system mainly based on authors recent publications. I enjoyed reading this article and seeing Table 1 because it summarizes recent findings at a glance.
To make this review better, I have two suggestions as follows.
1. In section 2.2 (Merkel Endings), the section ended by the statement that "It might be that the orientation of a mechanoreceptor plays an important role in the recognition of the direction of the stimulus." Do authors have an evidence for this (even in personal observations)? Rutlin et al. (2014, PMID: 25525881) reported that mammalian A_delta-LTMRs responded in different ways according to bent directions. If the orientation of mechanoreceptors would also affect the response to directional stimuli in whisker system, it would be interesting if authors argue by referring the result by Rutlin et al. (2014).
2. I found "Personal observations" or "Furuta et al., personal communications" as a reference in multiple areas. Will this observation be published somewhere soon or be currently under investigation stage? If these studies had been already presented at any academic conference, it would be better to cite the conference name rather than "personal communications" since readers may be able to read the abstract.
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Minor points:
- It seems that figures are created by PowerPoint software, so that spell check red underlines are presented. Authors should turn of spell check off that function to prevent from confusing that these underlines emphasize specific terms.
- In section 3.3, authors stated that "For instance, movement of the vibrisal matrix and/or the mechanoreceptors within the follicle might facilitate the evoking of responses by other receptors that are not directly involved with the vibrissa. Thus responses of mechanoreceptors may vary depending not only on vibrissal movements but also on the movements of other structures within the follicle." If this statement is correct, how animals can sense consistent mechanical input from outside body? It would be beneficial for readers if authors could their opinion (or possible experiment).
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Typo:
Section 1.2 (Relationship between Morphology and Physiology) - "Maximoff et al., 2014" would be "Maksimovic et al., 2014" - Authors should include "Woo et al., 2014" and "Ikeda et al., 2015" which also reported mechanosensitive responses from epidermal or whisker Merkel cells.
Section 2.6 (Free Nerve Endings) - Second paragraph, "TRV2 and TRV4" should be "TRPV2 and TRPV4"
