Should we consider unnamed genomospecies in genomic analyses?

Question

[Alec Watanabe]

Hi,

As the title says, should we include unnamed genomospecies in comparative genomics analyses, reverse vaccinology, CRISPR prediction, etc? (i.e. prediction of pan genome, core genome, accessory genome, etc).

I read that the "Report of the ad hoc committee on reconciliation of approaches to bacterial systematics" states: It is recommended that a distinct genomospecies that cannot be differenciated from another genomospecies on the basis of any known phenotypic property not be named until they can be differenciated by some phenotypic property.

So what I understood while searching a little bit about genomospecies is that a genomospecies is a new species basically because it presented differences at the genetic level but researchers couldn't identify phenotypic differences, is that right?

How should we proceed with these data? Include it in the analysis or not?

Thanks.

[h.mon]

not be named until they can be differentiated by some phenotypic property.

It doesn't say it shouldn't be considered, only it shouldn't be named. There are examples from the literature showing plenty of differences between "genomospecies", e.g. Campylobacter concisus Genomospecies 2 Is Better Adapted to the Human Gastrointestinal Tract as Compared with Campylobacter concisus Genomospecies 1.