Assessment of Evolutionary Relationships for Prioritization of Myxobacteria for Natural Product Discovery

Discoveries of novel myxobacteria have started to unveil the potentially vast phylogenetic diversity within the family Myxococcaceae and have brought about an updated approach to myxobacterial classification. While traditional approaches focused on morphology, 16S gene sequences, and biochemistry, modern methods including comparative genomics have provided a more thorough assessment of myxobacterial taxonomy. Herein, we utilize long-read genome sequencing for two myxobacteria previously classified as and , as well as four environmental myxobacteria newly isolated for this study. Average nucleotide identity and digital DNA-DNA hybridization scores from comparative genomics suggest previously classified as to instead be a novel member of the genus , to be a potentially novel member of the genus with high similarity to , and the four isolated myxobacteria to include another novel species, a novel species, a strain of , and a potentially novel species with high similarity to . We assess the biosynthetic potential of each sequenced myxobacterium and suggest that genus-level conservation of biosynthetic pathways support our preliminary taxonomic assignment. Altogether, we suggest that long-read genome sequencing benefits the classification of myxobacteria and improves determination of biosynthetic potential for prioritization of natural product discovery.