User:Cherin105/Sunda Arc/TimNMcN Peer Review

Peer review

General info

• Cherin105
• User:Cherin105/Sunda Arc (10/6/2020)

Lead

• I would slightly modify your language in the lead to make it less choppy:
  • The Sunda Arc is a volcanic arc that produced the volcanoes that form the topographic spine of the islands of Sumatra, Nusa Tenggara, and Java, the Sunda Strait and the Lesser Sunda Islands. The Sunda Arc begins at Sumatra and ends at Flores, and is adjacent to the Banda Arc.
  • The Sunda Arc is formed via the subduction of the Indo-Australian Plate beneath the Sunda and Burma plates at a velocity of 63-70 mm/year. The tectonic deformation along this subduction zone in the Java Trench (also known as the Sunda Trench) caused the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake of 26 December, 2004.
• (CHARIN) RESPONSE TO THE PEER REVIEW -- Lead
  • I agree that the lead section of my article is not coherent. I'm not sure if I tried to put too much information into this section or not. I adjusted them, as you suggested, to be more concise and captured the main point of my article as following. I cut the Tsunami part out because I feel like it was redundant for the introductory part.
    • This is my new introductory paragraph that I modified:
      • The Sunda Arc is a volcanic arc that produced the volcanoes that form the topographic spine of the islands of Sumatra, Nusa Tenggara, and Java, the Sunda Strait and the Lesser Sunda Islands. The Sunda Arc begins at Sumatra and ends at Flores, and is adjacent to the Banda Arc. The Sunda Arc is formed via the subduction of the Indo-Australian Plate beneath the Sunda and Burma plates at a velocity of 63-70 mm/year.

Content

• The content is generally excellent, so I will be very nit-picky about language here.
• Taking "Formation and Geologic Setting" as an example and going sentence-by-sentence:
  • "According to the geodynamic studies, mid-oceanic ridge basalts (MORB) is the main lithology of the oceanic basin south of Sunda."--Inversion, and a little technical
    • "Mid-oceanic ridge basalts (MORB) form most of the oceanic basin south of Sunda, according to geodynamic studies."
    • CHARIN: I edited this sentence to be "Mid-oceanic ridge basalts (MORB) form most of the oceanic basin south of Sunda, according to geodynamic studies. "
  • "The advent of this convergent plate boundary began in Early Miocene[3]." --Too wordy.
    • "These plates began converging in the Early Miocene."
    • CHARIN: I agree that it's wordy, so I changed them to be --> "These plates began to converge in the Early Miocene "
  • "The Indo-Australia Plate is subducted beneath the Eurasia Plate with the dip angle ranging from 49 to 56 degree." --Phrasing feels a little weird since the subduction is ongoing and degrees needs to be plural.
    • "The Indo-Australia Plate is subducting beneath the Eurasia Plate with the dip angle of 49-56 degrees."
    • CHARIN: Thank you for pointing out about the grammar issues. I rephrased the sentence to be --> "The Indo-Australian Plate is subducting beneath the Eurasian Plate with the dip angle of 49-56 degrees."
  • "The continuity of subducting slab beneath Java are affirmed down to lower mantle depth." --Affirmed is a weird word here, and "are" is plural while "the continuity" is singular.
    • "The slab subducting under Java are is continuous down to the lower mantle."
    • CHARIN: Thank you for pointing out about the grammar issues and the word choices. I adjusted this sentence to be --> "The slab subducting under Java is continuous down to the lower mantle. "
  • "However, there appears to have a detachment of slab beneath Sumatra island."--Too have a detachment is an odd phrasing
    • "However, the slab appears to beak apart under Sumatra Island."
    • CHARIN: I rephrased this sentence to be --> "However, the slab appears to beak apart under Sumatra Island."
  • "Regarding the tectonic setting of Sumatra, earthquake record reveals that there is no deep seismic activity due to the age of the subducting complex."--Very wordy and inverted
    • "Earthquake depth records indicate that there is no deep seismic activity in Sumatra, likely due to the age of the subducting complex."
    • CHARIN: I rephrased this sentence to be --> "Earthquake depth records indicate that there is no deep seismic activity in Sumatra, likely due to the age of the subducting complex."
  • "Two types of subductions have been identified along Sunda which are orthogonal subduction along Java and oblique subduction on the Sumatra side, spatially separated by the Sunda Strait."--I suggest using an actual list here
    • "Two types of subductions have been identified along the Sunda Arc: 1) orthogonal subduction along Java and 2) oblique subduction on the Sumatra side. These subductions are separated by the Sunda Strait."
    • CHARIN: I agree that the list I rephrased this sentence to be --> "Two types of subductions have been identified along the Sunda Arc: 1) orthogonal subduction along Java and 2) oblique subduction on the Sumatra side."
• Please review the entire article for similar patterns, as they are present throughout.
• (CHARIN) RESPONSE TO THE PEER REVIEW -- Content

• Thank you for these comments. English is my second language, so this's been very helpful. I fixed the grammar issues and adjusted the word choices and sentence structures following your recommendation as stated above.
  

Tone and Balance

There are no issues with tone or balance. No changes requested.

Sources and References

• The sources are very good.
• There are problems with the date in several of the sources, so the sources should be reviewed for the red error text.

(CHARIN) RESPONSE TO THE PEER REVIEW -- Source and References

• Some of the references are relatively old. However, that's due to the sparse study of some certain regions. Some area is not exhaustively studied, so some existing reference is sort of out of date. However, the information presented in these studies are relevant and come from respectable sources. I
• 1. Widiyantoro, S.; van der Hilst, R. (1996-03-15). --> This paper published in 1996. However, it offers a fact that is still relevant about the Sumatra island. Instead, I added one more publication that basically presents the same fact as this paper --> Complex slab subduction beneath northern Sumatra by J. D. Pesicek ,C. H. Thurber , S. Widiyantoro, E. R. Engdahl ,H. R. DeShon (2008)
• 2. I changed one paper from 1974 about potassic lava at East Java to be this paper from 2001 --> Petrology and Geochemistry of the Lamongan Volcanic Field, East Java, Indonesia: Primitive Sunda Arc Magmas in an Extensional Tectonic Setting from S. A. CARN, D. M. PYLE (2001)

Organization

• The organization is very good well thought out. No changes requested.

Images and Media

• The figures are good and useful.
• However, the captions should be improved:
  • "Geography" --> "A geographic view of the geography surrounding the Sunda and Banda Arcs"
  • "Tsunami in 2004 @ Aceh, Indonesia" --> "The aftermath of the 2004 tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia"
  • "Map of volcanoes in Indonesia" --> "A map of volcanoes in Indonesia"
  • "Mt. Merapi" --> "Mount Merapi on Java"
  • "" --> "A geographic view of the subduction around Sumatra"
• (CHARIN) RESPONSE TO THE PEER REVIEW -- Image and Media
  • All the comments about the captions are really helpful. I also agree with you that my previous captions lack a certain nuance or need some minor modifications. I already edited the captions according to your recommendation.
    • 1. From "Geography" to be --> A geographic view of the geography surrounding the Sunda and Banda Arcs
    • 2. From "Tsunami in 2004 @ Aceh, Indonesia" to be --> The aftermath of the 2004 tsunami in Aceh, Indonesia
    • 3. From "Map of volcanoes in Indonesia" to be --> A map showing chains of volcanoes in Indonesia
    • 4. From "Mt. Merapi" to be --> Mount Merapi on Java Island
    • 5. From "" to be --> A geographic view of the subduction around Sumatra

Overall impressions

• This is an excellent and thorough article that needs close language editing and minor changes around the edges.