ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Microbiol.
Sec. Terrestrial Microbiology
Saccharothrix camelliae sp. nov., isolated from rhizosphere soil of Camellia oleifera and proposal of Saccharothrix yanglingensis Yan et al. 2012 as a later heterotypic synonym of Saccharothrix longispora (Preobrazhenskaya and Sveshnikova 1974) Grund and Kroppenstedt
Provisionally accepted
- Hunan University of Arts and Science, Changde, China
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A novel actinobacterial strain, designated HUAS TT1T, was isolated from the rhizosphere soil of Camellia oleifera collected from Changde city of Hunan Province, China. Sequence analysis of the full-length 16S rRNA gene revealed that strain HUAS TT1T belonged to the genus Saccharothrix and shared the highest sequence similarities to Saccharothrix yanglingensis Hhs.015T (99.30%), Saccharothrix carnea NEAU-yn17T (98.89%), Saccharothrix hoggarensis SA181T (98.89%), Saccharothrix saharensis SA152T (98.82%) and Saccharothrix longispora NRRL B-16116T (98.75%). Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that and strain HUAS TT1T was related to Saccharothrix yanglingensis Hhs.015T and Saccharothrix longispora NRRL B-16116T. Phylogenetic analysis based on whole-genome sequences and 120 core gene sequences showed that the evolutionary neighbors of strain HUAS TT1T were Saccharothrix hoggarensis SA181T and Saccharothrix saharensis SA152T. However, the ANIb/m and dDDH values between the whole-genome sequences of strain HUAS TT1T and Saccharothrix hoggarensis SA181T/Saccharothrix saharensis SA152T were 85.82%/88.80% and 32.90%, 86.42%/89.43% and 34.40%, respectively, well below 95–96% and 70% cut-off points recommended for delineating species, suggesting that strain HUAS TT1T is a novel Saccharothrix species. This result was further verified by phenotypic and chemotaxonomic features between them. So, according to above data, strain HUAS TT1T represents a novel species of the genus Saccharothrix, for which the name Saccharothrix camelliae sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is HUAS TT1T (=MCCC 1K09364T = JCM 37292T). In addition, the phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and genotypic characteristics, as well as phylogenetic information indicated that S. yanglingensis CGMCC 4.5627T and S. longispora CGMCC 4.1357T should belong to the same species. Therefore, on the basis of these results and Rule 42 of the Bacteriological Code, we propose that Saccharothrix yanglingensis Yan et al. 2025 is a later heterotypic synonym of Saccharothrix longispora (Preobrazhenskaya and Sveshnikova 1974) Grund and Kroppenstedt 1990 for which an emended description is given.
Keywords: Camellia oleifera, Heterotypic synonym, Novel species, polyphasic taxonomy, Saccharothrix camelliae
Received: 30 Sep 2025; Accepted: 08 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Ping. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Mo Ping
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