Draft Genome Sequence of a Taxonomically Unique Neisseria Strain Isolated from a Greater White-Fronted Goose (Anser albifrons) Egg on the North Slope of Alaska.

We report here the draft genome sequence of a unique Neisseria strain that was isolated from a greater white-fronted goose (Anser albifrons) egg. The sequencing was performed with an Illumina MiSeq system, and the sequence consists of 275 contigs. The total genome is 2,397,978 bp long and has a G+C content of 46.4%.

GENOME ANNOUNCEMENT

The order Neisseriales consists of 32 genera, including the important pathogens Neisseria gonorrhoeae and Neisseria meningitidis (1). Other species of Neisseriales are sometimes isolated from human and animal specimens (2, 3). There are reports of Neisseria species being isolated from a sheldrake liver (4), the cloaca and phallus of domestic geese (5), and duck feces (6), and there is one report of Neisseria animalis being isolated from a mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) egg (7).

During the summer of 2013, we isolated a Neisseria species from the contents of 21 nonviable greater white-fronted goose (Anser albifrons) eggs on the North Slope of Alaska (8). We identified the DNA of this same species in an additional 2 nonviable eggs. Here, we report the draft genome sequence of a unique Neisseria strain (KH1503) isolated from the contents of an addled greater white-fronted goose egg. Based on our sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene and chaperonin 60 gene, this isolate seems to be most closely related to Neisseria canis, Neisseria animaloris, or Neisseria shayeganii. The identity scores for full-length (>1,400 bp) 16S rRNA gene sequences are ≤97%.

A pure culture was obtained by growing the isolate on blood agar plates at 37°. Bacteria were grown overnight in tryptic soy broth and pelleted by centrifugation at 5,000 × g for 10 min, and genomic DNA was extracted using a Wizard genomic DNA purification kit (Promega, Madison, WI). Genomic DNA was used to prepare a sequencing library using a Nextera DNA sample preparation kit (Illumina, San Diego, CA). Sequencing was performed on an Illumina MiSeq version 2 system and generated 24 to 30 million paired-end reads (2 × 250 bp), for a total of 7.4 Gbp.

We assembled the bacterial genome de novo using SPAdes version 2.5.1 (9). The assembled contigs totaled 2,397,978 bp. The assembly consisted of 275 contigs, ranging in size from 209 bp to 242,609 bp (median, 244 bp; mean, 8,720 bp) with a G+C content of 46.4%. We annotated the genome assembly using the NCBI Prokaryotic Genomes Annotation Pipeline (10). There are 2,334 putative genes, 2,159 coding sequences (CDSs), 122 pseudogenes, 3 rRNAs, 49 tRNAs, and 1 noncoding RNA. The genome sequence of this organism will allow for its further characterization and assessment of pathogen potential.

Nucleotide sequence accession numbers.

The draft genome sequence of Neisseria sp. KH1503 has been deposited at DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank under the accession no. JTDO00000000. The version described in this paper is version JTDO01000000.