A taxonomic study of plant pathogenicCorynebacteriumspecies

Abstract

Methods that have been developed and standardised in our laboratory for the determination of cultural and biochemical characters of plant pathogenic bacteria have been used to provide data for numerical analyses of 121 strains of 13 phytopathogenic species of Corynebacterium Lehmann & Neumann 1896. Our results show them to be a relatively homogeneous group of organisms which should be classified within a single genus. Other workers have made proposals to exclude plant pathogenic coryneform species from Corynebacterium, but we consider that detailed comparative evidence is insufficient to justify their transfer to any other genus. However, we cannot support the present division of coryneform plant pathogens into 13 species, and propose the following classification.