Genomic molecular signatures determined characterization of Mycolicibacterium gossypii sp. nov., a fast-growing mycobacterial species isolated from cotton field soil

A Gram-positive, acid-fast and rapidly growing rod, designated S2-37 T , that could form yellowish colonies was isolated from soil samples collected from cotton cropping field located in the Xinjiang region of China. The draft genome of strain S2-37 T was 5.1 Mb in length, with a DNA G+C content of 68.4 mol%. 16S rRNA-directed phylogenetic analysis referred that strain S2-37 T was closely related to bacterial species belonging to the genus Mycolicibacterium and Mycobacterium . Multilocus sequence analysis of three genes (16S rRNA, hsp65 and rpoB ) revealed that strain S2-37 T shared high sequence similarities with Mycolicibacterium litorale CGMCC 4.5724 T (96.5%) and Mycobacterium neglectum CECT 8778 T (95.7%). Digital DNA-DNA hybridization (dDDH) and the average nucleotide identity (ANI) presented that strainS2-37 T displayed the highest values of 39.1% (35.7-42.6%) and 81.28% with M. litorale CGMCC 4.5724 T , respectively. And characterazition of conserved molecular signatures further confirmed that strain S2-37 T could be well classified into the genus Mycolicibacterium . The main fatty acids were identified as C 16:0 , C 18:0 , C 20:3 ω3 and C 22:6 ω3 . In addition, polar lipids profile was mainly composed of diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine and phosphatidylinositol. Results indicated that strain S2-37 T represented genetically and phenotypically distinct from its closest phylogenetic neighbour, M. litorale CGMCC 4.5724 T . Here, we propose a novel species of the genus Mycolicibacterium : Mycolicibacterium gossypii sp. nov. with the type strain S2-37 T (=JCM 34327T =CGMCC 1.18817T ).