Rahnella victoriana sp nov., Rahnella bruchi sp nov., Rahnella woolbedingensis sp nov., classification of Rahnella genomospecies 2 and 3 as Rahnella variigena sp nov and Rahnella inusitata sp nov., respectively and emended description of the genus Rahnella

Isolations from oak symptomatic of Acute Oak Decline, alder and walnut log tissue, and buprestid beetles in 2009-2012 yielded 32 Gram-negative bacterial strains showing highest gyrB sequence similarity to Rahnella aquatilis and Ewingella americana. Multilocus sequence analysis (using partial gyrB, rpoB, infB and atpD gene sequences) delineated the strains into six MLSA groups. Two MLSA groups contained reference strains of Rahnella genomospecies 2 and 3, three groups clustered within the Rahnella clade with no known type or reference strains and the last group contained the type strain of E. americana. DNA-DNA relatedness assays using both the microplate and fluorometric methods, confirmed that each of the five Rahnella MLSA groups formed separate taxa. Rahnella genomospecies 2 and 3 were previously not formally described due to a lack of distinguishing phenotypic characteristics. In the present study, all five Rahnella MLSA groups were phenotypically differentiated from each other and from R. aquatilis. Therefore we propose to classify the strains from symptomatic oak, alder and walnut and buprestid beetles as: Rahnella victoriana sp. nov. (type strain FRB 225(T) = LMG 27717(T) = DSM 27397(T)), Rahnella variigena sp. nov. (previously Rahnella genomosp. 2, type strain CIP 105588(T) = LMG 27711(T)), Rahnella inusitata sp. nov. (previously Rahnella genomosp. 3, type strain DSM 30078(T) = LMG 2640(T)), Rahnella bruchi sp. nov. (type strain FRB 226(T) = LMG 27718(T) = DSM 27398(T)) and Rahnella woolbedingensis sp. nov. (type strain FRB 227(T) = LMG 27719(T) = DSM 27399(T)). Crown Copyright (C) 2014 Published by Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.