Gordonia iterans sp. nov., isolated from a patient with pneumonia

A second novel clinical actinobacterial strain, designated IFM 10348(T), was isolated from the sputum of the same Japanese patient with bacterial pneumonia from whom the type strain of Gordonia araii had been isolated. The strains differed in phylogenetic position and drug-resistance profiles. The taxonomic position of strain IFM 10348(T) was clarified by phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic studies. Phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rRNA gene sequences clearly demonstrated that strain IFM 10348(T) occupied a distinct clade within the genus Gordonia and was related closely to Gordonia malaquae DSM 45064(T) and Gordonia hirsuta DSM 44140(T) (97.3 and 97.1% similarities, respectively). Strain IFM 10348(T) was also clearly differentiated from G. malaquae DSM 45064(T) and G. hirsuta DSM 44140(T) based on gyrB and secA1 gene sequence similarity values. Strain IFM 10348(T) had MK-9(H2) as the predominant menaquonine, contained meso-diaminopimelic acid, arabinose, galactose and glucosamine as cell-wall components, and contained C18:1ω9c, summed feature 3 (C16:1ω7c and/or C16:1ω6c) and C16:0 as the major cellular fatty acids. Mycolic acids were present. The DNA G+C content of strain IFM 10348(T) was 68.0 mol%. DNA-DNA relatedness data coupled with the combination of genotypic and phenotypic data indicated that strain IFM 10348(T) represents a novel species of the genus Gordonia, for which the name Gordonia iterans sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is IFM 10348(T) ( = CCTCC M2011245(T) = NCCB 100436(T)).