Williamsia soli sp. nov., an actinobacterium isolated from soil at a thermal power plant in Yantai, China.

Strain C17, a novel strain belonging to the phylum Actinobacteria, was isolated from a thermal power plant in Yantai, Shandong Province, China. Cells of strain C17 were Gram stain positive, aerobic, pink, non-motile and round with neat edges, showing optimum growth at 28 °C. Phylogenetically, strain C17 was a member of the class Actinobacteria, order Mycobacteriales, family Gordoniaceae. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequence comparisons revealed that the related strains were Williamsia faeni JCM 17784 and Williamsia limnetica KCTC 19981 with pairwise sequence similarity of 98.5% for both strains. According to the draft genome sequence, the DNA G + C content was 64.7%. The average amino acid identity (AAI), average nucleotide identity (ANI) and digital DNA-DNA hybridization (dDDH) values between genome sequences of strain C17 and the closest type strain W. faeni JCM 17784 were 77.5, 77.9, and 20.7%, respectively. Predominant fatty acids were C (31.7%) and Cω9c (26.8%). The major menaquinone was MK-9. The diagnostic phospholipids were phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), diphosphatidylglycerol (DPG), and phosphatidylinositol (PI). Therefore, the combined phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic data indicated that strain C17 was considered to represent a novel species of the genus Williamsia. Williamsia soli sp. nov. was proposed for strain C17 (= KCTC 49567 = MCCC 1K04355).