| name | cc-peer-review-revision |
| description | Use when responding to Cancer Cell (Cell Press) reviewer reports — planning new experiments, writing a point-by-point response, and calibrating claims for revision. It structures the rebuttal and revision; it does not run the experiments or design them from scratch. |
Peer Review & Revision (cc-peer-review-revision)
When to trigger
- A decision letter with reviewer reports has arrived (major/minor revision)
- You must triage requested experiments vs. textual changes
- Reviewers ask for additional in vivo / human validation or rigor fixes
- A consultative / cross-referee comment requires reconciling reviews
Cell Press review context
Cancer Cell uses editorial assessment plus external peer review, and Cell Press can run consultative (cross-referee) review where reviewers see each other's comments. Practical implications:
- Reviewers may converge on shared concerns — address the cross-cutting issue, not just each bullet.
- The editor's letter signals which points are essential vs. optional; prioritize those.
- New experiments that strengthen orthogonal validation (in vivo / human) carry the most weight.
Triage every comment
| Reviewer ask | Response mode |
|---|
| "Does this hold in vivo / in patients?" | New experiment (highest priority) — plan via cc-study-design |
| "Cell line unauthenticated / antibody not validated" | Rigor fix — cc-reporting-standards |
| "n unclear / pseudo-replication / wrong test" | Reanalyze + report — cc-statistics |
| "Representative image without quantification" | Quantify across replicates — cc-figures-tables |
| "Overstated claim" | Narrow the claim — cc-writing-style |
| "Missing control / rescue" | Add control experiment |
| Disagreement / out-of-scope request | Respectful, evidence-based pushback |
Point-by-point response structure
For each comment:
- Quote the reviewer's point verbatim.
- State the change: new data, reanalysis, or text edit.
- Point to where in the revision it appears (new Figure 4C, Methods p. X, lines Y–Z).
- If you disagree, give a courteous, data-backed rationale — do not ignore it.
Open the response with a brief summary of the major new experiments and how the paper improved. Keep tone professional and concrete; reviewers and editor read this closely.
Revision discipline
- Do not over-revise into a different paper; address what was asked.
- When adding in vivo / human data, carry through the same rigor (controls,
n, randomization, blinding, deposition of any new datasets).
- Update the Key Resources Table, availability statement, and statistics for any new experiments.
- Re-run the
cc-submission preflight before resubmitting.
- If you cannot do an experiment, explain why and offer the strongest feasible alternative.
Worked micro-example: a point-by-point entry
Reviewer 2, comment 3 (verbatim): "The MARK7 phenotype is shown only in cell lines. Does loss of
MARK7 restrain tumor growth in an immunocompetent in vivo setting?"
Response (the Cancer Cell pattern):
We agree this was the central gap. We generated Mark7-conditional autochthonous tumors and, in a
new Figure 5D–F, show that MARK7 loss reduced tumor burden and restored intratumoral CD8⁺ T cell
infiltration (n=9 vs. 10 mice; randomized to arms; blinded histology scoring; log-rank p reported in
the legend). The in vivo RNA-seq is deposited under GEO [accession] (KRT updated). We have accordingly
revised the Summary and Discussion to state a "candidate vulnerability for checkpoint combination"
rather than a "therapeutic target," matching the evidence now in hand.
Note the moves: it concedes the point, delivers the highest-value experiment (in vivo, immunocompetent),
carries full rigor (n, randomization, blinding), deposits the new data, and narrows the claim in the
same breath — the reviewer sees the manuscript improve, not merely defend itself.
Framing pushback that survives consultative review
Because reviewers may see each other's reports, a rebuttal that dismisses one referee can alienate the
panel. When you decline an experiment:
- Grant the scientific premise before explaining the constraint (feasibility, timeline, model
availability, or that the request tests a different hypothesis).
- Offer the strongest feasible substitute (orthogonal assay, existing cohort reanalysis, published data).
- Where a request is genuinely out of scope, say what the paper does claim and confine the finding
accordingly rather than arguing the reviewer is wrong.
Cancer Cell revision failure modes
- Adding an in vivo experiment with a lower bar than the original (no randomization,
n of 3, no
blinded scoring) — reviewers notice the rigor drop immediately.
- Answering the "does it hold in patients?" comment with more cell-line data.
- Depositing nothing new even though the revision generated sequencing or proteomics data.
- Re-broadening the Summary/Highlights after narrowing the Results — front matter and body must agree.
- A rebuttal letter that resolves minor textual points in detail but leaves the essential mechanistic
ask half-answered.
Checklist
Anti-patterns
- Selectively answering easy comments and ignoring hard ones
- Adding new data with weaker rigor than the original (no controls, undefined
n)
- Dismissive or defensive rebuttals to disagreements
- Claiming a change was made without pointing to where
- Re-broadening claims the reviewers asked you to narrow
- Forgetting to deposit datasets generated during revision
Output format
【Decision】major / minor revision
【Essential points】editor-flagged: [...]
【Cross-cutting concern】...
【New experiments planned】(rigor + n + deposition): [...]
【Per-comment plan】R1.1 → ...; R1.2 → ...; R2.1 → ...
【Claims to narrow】...
【Pushback (with rationale)】...
【Next step】execute revisions → re-run cc-submission preflight
