User:Veryhappybubbles!/Agricultural chemistry/Movingqlong Peer Review

General info

 * Whose work are you reviewing?

Veryhappybubbles!


 * Link to draft you're reviewing
 * Agricultural chemistry draft
 * Link to the current version of the article (if it exists)
 * Agricultural chemistry

Evaluate the drafted changes
Hi Veryhappybubbles!, please read my peer review of your draft article below. The bullet points are in order of the guiding questions. I bolded bullet points that have specific comments/suggestions/improvements. The rest of the bullet points are less important, but still worth a read! At the end of each guiding questions section I added general overall comments with what you did well and what can be further improved. Good luck with the rest of your editing!

Lead
Comments for the lead section: I think you can remove some content from this section because a) it's not further discussed in the article and b) there are no citations for it at the moment. I like how you broke up the first sentence, though, as it clarifies what agricultural chemistry is before it gives specific examples of what it includes.
 * There is one grammar edit to the lead, but no content changes
 * The change mentioned in the previous bullet point definitely clarified what agricultural chemistry is in a more general sense before delving into its subtopics
 * The lead seems to include information that isn't discussed at all later in the article ie. chemurgy, the technology aspects of agricultural chemistry, "test-tube chemistry", etc. It may be a good idea to expand on those topics or remove them from the article to make it more cohesive
 * See the previous bullet point
 * I think the lead is overly detailed and alludes to things not later discussed. The lead can definitely be shortened or tailored to what is later discussed in the article

Content

 * The added sections are very interesting and relevant to the topic. I also like the choice of removing the "History" section because it wasn't doing much for the article.
 * The added content is up to date; the part about GMOs is recent
 * I'd still like to see something more about sustainability in agricultural chemistry/practices. I'd also like to see a source for "Modern agrochemical industry has gained a reputation for its maximising profits while violating sustainable and ecologically viable agricultural principles." I think it's an interesting point and could tie into content added later like how they still use pesticides and GMOs. I think something that's missing from the article is considering livestock since "animal feed supplements" are mentioned in the first paragraph of the "Sciences" section but you only added things about plants modifications.
 * I think the article is getting there! I liked the section about soil chemistry and plant biochemistry as they relate to agriculture.

Comments for the content: I like the content you added! I especially like the soil chemistry and plant biochemistry sections because they delve deeper into what was mentioned in the sciences section that you didn't edit. That being said, since you expanded on some sections mentioned in the sciences section itself, I suggest removing the detail in that section so that content doesn't repeat in the sections you added. Another suggestion is to move relevant content from that section into your new sections as "lead ins" to your section like you did for "Soil Chemistry". Something else to consider is herbicides, insecticides, etc. which are mentioned earlier in the article as well. Maybe you can find more context for that and group it in with your pesticides section (with a new heading). Something else to consider is delving deeper into fertilizers in your "Soil Chemistry" section. Who makes fertilizers? Is it agricultural chemists? Are there any new developments into fertilizer-making ie. using waste products for fertilizers? I think that would be great information to have!

Another suggestion is just to link to other Wikipedia pages when relevant (ie. in the Plant Biochemistry section, linking "genetically modified crops", "vaccines", "plastics", etc. Also to link to specific pesticides that you mention in that section if those pages exist) to make the article more "general public friendly".

I don't know if you intentionally left out the "See also" section, but I think it would be good to keep it in.

Again, I would still like to see something more about sustainable practices/technological developments in agricultural chemistry if there are any! For example, what's up with greenhouses? What about those UV-light lamps people use to grow plants indoors? Were those initially agricultural chemistry inventions? I'm unsure if they're related or not, but food for thought for you!

Tone and Balance
 Comments about tone and balance:  I like the direction you took with your added content; it highlights both pros and cons of certain practices. I also like that each of the sections you added related to bettering crop yields/food quality. I think you should emphasize that point more in the lead if that's the route you're continuing to go with for your future edits (see the last bullet point above). Since you're going down a "better quality food" route, something to consider is how livestock is affected by agricultural chemistry ie. how does using feed supplements affect the chicken eggs or beef you get.
 * The content added is neutral. I especially like that the added sections give pros and cons (like the Pesticides section)
 * Nothing appears heavily biased to a particular viewpoint. One suggestion is to include other things "Plant Biochemistry" includes other than GMOs (if any)
 * No viewpoints appear over/underrepresented. As mentioned in the last viewpoint, if there's anything else Plant Biochemistry includes, I think it would be great to mention.
 * It's not explicit, but I think something that links all the newly added sections is kind of about increasing crop yields/food quality, which is discussed a bit in the lead (ie. "Its applied science and technology aspects are directed toward control of those processes to increase yields, improve quality, and reduce costs."). In that case, I think it would be great to emphasize that point in the lead by breaking up the paragraph or (per the previous suggestion), remove other information from the lead. To answer the question, I think the added content is leading readers to realizing that agricultural chemistry is about producing quality crops for better food. I think it's a good point.

Sources and References
 Comments for sources and references:  Great job on finding reputable sources! Mostly everything you added is well-documented by a reliable source. I think something else to consider is that since your subsections may have their own Wikipedia page (ie. pesticides) you can also see what sources they reference and if there's anything else you can add in an agricultural chemistry context. Something else you can work on is finding sources for the lead and "Sciences" section if you plan on keeping those in the article. Again, the suggestion about going to the linked pages to see what is specifically referenced may help you dig out some reliable references for those claims. I think finding more than one source per section (ie. Plant Biochemistry) will also improve the article by giving different views on or further reinforce the same topic as well. One final note is that one of your citations is flagged by Wikipedia; you can manually fix this if you edit the reference and remove the "-12" from the (2013-12) of the date.
 * All new content is backed by reliable sources (ie. papers, official government websites, online books, etc.)
 * "The most common form of nitrogen fertilization source is urea, but ammonium sulphate, diammonium phosphate, and calcium ammonium phosphate are also used" - I don't see where they mention this in the chapter you cited
 * The sources are mostly review articles, which is a great for an overview of each of the topics
 * The sources are mostly current. If possible, I think finding more recent sources about pesticides will be good if they discuss environmental impact or things like that
 * The sources and the author look quite diverse
 * You've already been implementing articles, so I think you're on the right track!
 * All of the links work

Organization

 * Content added is well-written
 * A few: "The discovery of the Haber-Bosch process has led to an increase in production of crops in the 20th century", "Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's) are one way of achieving this."
 * I think the content you added work well as sub-sections. A suggestion for the title of the section can be "Improving Crops" or something similar since everything you added is about increasing crop yield/food quality

 Comments for organization:  Again, I like the subsections you added, but I think they would benefit from falling under a main section called "Improving Crops" or something similar. If you decide to keep the "Sciences" section in, I think you can just keep the first paragraph since you go deeper into the topics discussed in the later two paragraphs. Great job breaking up the subsections, though! I like that what's highlighted gives readers a sense of how broad agricultural chemistry is from soil quality to plant genetics, etc. One suggestion is to group the "Soil Chemistry" and "Plant Biochemistry" sections next to each other. That way, if you find any further information on how GMOs are affected by soil chemistry, the sections being sequential will make more sense!

Images and Media
 Comments for images and media:  Since you haven't added any pictures yet, I'd like to suggest adding something about soil chemistry, agricultural chemists, something about increasing crop yields, or something about GMOs, pesticide production, etc. If my earlier suggestions about greenhouses or something is taken up, maybe you can add an image about that.

Overall impressions

 * Article has been expanded upon!
 * Strengths: explaining how crops are maximized, fertility of soil is increased, etc; new citations
 * Improvements: making sure to remember Brogan (ie. removing superfluous words. For example: "Pesticides are chemicals that can increase play an important role in increasing crop yield and mitigating mitigate crop losses", remembering to keep it general public friendly

 Comments for overall impressions : I think you've made good headway into improving the article. I like the expansions you made and how they relate to agricultural chemistry. Some minor suggestions to your existing content is to remember Brogan ie. remove superfluous words and favor active voice.

I don't think you've reached "non-trivial" improvements yet. However, taking into account the suggestions previously mentioned, I think you'll make the article the best it can be. Good luck!

-Movingqlong

Response to Peer Review
Hi Movingqlong,

Thank you for all your feedback! I tried my best to fix my lead section- hopefully now it's more organized. I also reorganized a large chunk of the article and renamed "sciences" to "advantages and disadvantages" and moved a lot of the content around. I also tried to delete stuff in the lead that wasn't relevant to the rest of the article, and add stuff that was. I did my best to fix all the important parts that you bolded- you found a mistake in my citations which I appreciate and I fixed it. I also fixed most of your grammar/ brogan suggestions. I must admit that deleting the history section was unintentional, but seeing as quite a few of the citations are broken in that section and you also suggested that it doesn't add very much to the article, I kept it as deleted. As for including other sections on animal feed supplements/ sustainability etc, while I'm sure they would improve the article, there are so many aspects to agricultural chemistry that I decided to just focus on 3 that I found most important. I did, however, try to move/ add things around to provide a bit more detail and clarity. I also added an image!

Thank you so much for your feedback, I really appreciate it!

- Veryhappybubbles!