Proposal of Lysobacter pythonis sp. nov. isolated from royal pythons (Python regius)

The bacterial strains 4284/11T and 812/17 isolated from the respiratory tract of two royal pythons in 2011 and 2017, respectively were subjected to taxonomic characterization. The 16S rRNA gene sequences of the two strains were identical and showed highest sequence similarities to Lysobacter tolerans UM1^T (97.2%) and Luteimonas aestuarii DSM 19680^T (96.7 %). The two strains were identical in the sequences of the 16S-23S rRNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and partial groEL gene sequences and almost identical in genomic fingerprints. In the ITS sequence Ly. tolerans DSM 28473^T and in the groEL nucleotide sequence Luteimonas mephitis DSM 12574^T showed the highest similarity. In silico DDH analyses using genome sequence based ANIb and gANI similarity coefficients demonstrated that strain 4284/11^T represents a novel species and revealed Ly. tolerans UM1^T as the next relative (ANIb = 76.2 %, gANI = 78.0 %). Based on the topology of a core gene phylogeny strain 4284/11^T could be assigned to the genus Lysobacter. Chemotaxonomic characteristics including polyamine pattern, quinone system, polar lipid profile and fatty acid profile were in accordance with the characteristics of the genera Lysobacter and Luteimonas. Strains 4284/11^T and 812/17 could be differentiated from the type strains of the most closely related species by several physiological tests. In conclusion we are here proposing the novel species Lysobacter pythonis sp. nov. The type strain is 4284/11^T (= CCM 8829^T = CCUG 72164^T = LMG 30630^T) and strain 812/17 (CCM 8830) is a second strain of this species.