The topical editor acknowledges the important work realized by the authors to improve the first version of the manuscript.

ABSTRACT

Make the sentence “The inversion results show followings” broader, something as:
“This study clearly illustrates that GOCE data are helpful in understanding the geological settings and tectonic structures at regional scale, here the NCC. Indeed, we show that… “

Avoid references in your abstract, in order to keep it self-consistent.

MAIN TEXT

For some figure captions there are some extra spaces, e.g. Fig 13. (a) Txx , (b) Txz , (c) Tyy , (d) Tzz

For some figures: note that different panels have different color scales. You need to indicate this (e.g. “Note the color scales are different”), and in the text to motivate this choice. It will be nicer to have on each color-scale a clear min/max (e.g. Fig 6 for 80 km, the max is exactly at 0.06, but for 100km is > 0.06 and < 0.08 (considering the 0.02 tick intervals)

“E represents eastern NCC, N represents central NCC, W represents western NCC” – using N for center is somehow confusing (one might think at northern NCC). Why not to use “C” (center) or “M” (middle). Attention – if you agree to implement this change, it has to be done in figures as well.

Dear authors

Thanks for considering the editor's suggestions. Please also consider the input from one of the reviewers, comment which has been sent after my previous decision. This is an important point to improve the actual version.

-----

Referee’s comments on the revised manuscript se-2019-181
Title: “Joint inversion of the lithospheric density structure in the North China Craton based on GOCE satellite gravity gradient data and surface gravity data”
Authors: Yu Tian and Yong Wang

While the revised version addresses well most of the points previously identified, one major remains unanswered. I think this comment is important and, if addressed appropriately, will help the article to deliver its message with relevance.

In this revised version, the authors well quantify the contribution of each correction applied on the data before the inversion. We can see that these corrections are of the same order of magnitude as the final corrected data. My initial concern is to quantify the impact of these corrections on the final density models, notably the impacts of the crust and sedimentary thicknesses not always very well constrained. For example, it will be interesting to know what is the impact of a few kilometer error in the CRUST Moho and sedimentary depths on the final results. This a good way to estimate the robustness (with error bars) of the final density values obtained in the study area.

Other question: You extended the geographic area by 10° for the corrections computation. Why 10°?

Dear Yu Tian and Yong Wang,

I am pleased to accept your manuscript for publication in Solid Earth. I would like to thank you for the revisions and for choosing Solid Earth to publish your work.

With best regards,
Susanne Buiter
Executive Editor