Non-diphtheriae Corynebacterium species have been increasingly recognized as the causative agents of infections in humans. Differential identification of these bacteria in the clinical microbiology laboratory by the most commonly used biochemical tests is challenging, and normally requires additional molecular methods. Herein, we present the annotated draft genome sequences of two isolates of "difficult-to-identify" human-pathogenic corynebacterial species: C. xerosis and C. minutissimum. The genome sequences of ca. 2.7 Mbp, with a mean number of 2,580 protein encoding genes, were also compared with the publicly available genome sequences of strains of C. amycolatum and C. striatum. These results will aid the exploration of novel biochemical reactions to improve existing identification tests as well as the development of more accurate molecular identification methods through detection of species-specific target genes for isolate's identification or drug susceptibility profiling.
Keywords: Biochemical tests; Corynebacterium spp.; Emerging pathogens; Molecular identification.