Reclassification of Brevibacterium liquefaciens Okabayashi and Masuo 1960 as Arthrobacter nicotianae Giovannozzi-Sermanni 1959

Brevibacterium liquefaciens ATCC 14929^T was reclassified as Corynebacterium liquefaciens by Lanéelle et al. (1980). A further study by Stackebrandt et al. (1983) described the same strain, indicating high genomic and chemotaxonomic relatedness to Arthrobacter nicotianae; however, reclassification was not formally proposed. Because of the discrepancies between their previous work and the data of Collins & Kroppenstedt (1983), Lanéelle and colleagues re-examined B. liquefaciens and withdrew their recommendation for the assignment of B. liquefaciens to the genus Corynebacterium (Lanéelle et al., 1984). Formal reclassification of B. liquefaciens as A. nicotianae is now proposed.