Taxonomic relatedness between Pectobacterium carotovorum subsp carotovorum, Pectobacterium carotovorum subsp odoriferum and Pectobacterium carotovorum subsp brasiliense subsp nov

Aims Pectobacterium carotovorum is a heterogeneous species consisting of two named subspecies, P. carotovorum subsp. carotovorum and P. carotovorum subsp. odoriferum. A third subspecies, P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense, was previously proposed. The study aimed to confirm the subspecies status and validate the proposed name of P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense using a novel and standard microbial taxonomy. Methods and Results DNA-DNA hybridization confirmed that P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense is a different species from P. wasabiae, P. betavasculorum and P. atrosepticum, with 28, 35 and 55% similarity values, respectively, but is a member of the P. carotovorum species with 73-77% similarity values. Sequencing the entire 16S rRNA gene of two polymorphic copies from strains of each of the P. carotovorum subspecies demonstrated that the average 16S rRNA gene sequence diversity between P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense and P. carotovorum subsp. carotovorum was lower than the maximum genetic distances between two sequence types obtained from the same strain. Multilocus sequence analysis based on eight housekeeping genes (mtlD, acnA, icdA, mdh, pgi, gabA, proA and rpoS) differentiated the subspecies and delineated two P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense clades. Conclusion Pectobacterium carotovorum subsp. brasiliense clade I was comprised of strains isolated from Brazil and Peru, while clade II included strains from Asia, North America and Europe. Strains in clade I but not clade II were phenotypically consistent with the original description of P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense in that they produced reducing substances from sucrose and acid from a-methyl glucoside. The type strain for P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense 212T (= LMG2137T = IBSBF1692T = CFBP6617T) was previously designated. The GC mol content of the type strain is 51.7%. Significant and Impact of the Study the study introduces a full description for the strains belonging to the two different clades assigned to P. carotovorum subsp. brasiliense.