Nocardia elegans sp. nov., a member of the Nocardia vaccinii clade isolated from sputum

Two bacterial isolates from the sputa of a patient with a pulmonary infection were subjected to a polyphasic taxonomic study. Chemotaxonomic investigations revealed the presence of cell-wall chemotype IV and mycolic acids consistent with the profile for the genus Nocardia. Comparative 16S rRNA gene sequencing showed that these isolates constitute a distinct subline within the genus Nocardia, displaying 99.6-95.5% sequence similarities with established species. However, DNA-DNA hybridization studies demonstrated unambiguously that the isolates are genealogically distinct from closely related species, namely Nocardia veterana and Nocardia africana, which show high levels of 16S rRNA sequence similarity (99.2 and 99.6% sequence similarity, respectively). On the basis of both phenotypic and phylogenetic evidence, it is proposed that these isolates be classified as a novel species of the genus Nocardia, for which the name Nocardia elegans sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is IMMIB N-402(T) (=CCUG 50200(T)=CIP 108553(T)).