Xanthomarina Gelatinilytica Gen. Nov., Sp Nov., Isolated From Seawater

A novel Gram-stain-negative, rod-shaped, yellow-pigmented, non-sporulating, non-motile bacterium, designated strain AK20(T), was isolated from seawater collected from Kochi city, Kerala state, India. Colonies on marine agar were circular, yellow, shiny, translucent, 2-3 mm in diameter, convex and with entire margin. Flexirubin-type pigment was present. The fatty acids were dominated by iso-branched units with a high abundance of iso-C-15 : 0, iso-C-15 : 1 G, iso-C-17 : 0 3-OH, summed feature 3 (C-16 : 1 omega 7c and/or iso-C-15 : 0 2-OH) and iso-C-15 : 0 3-OH. Polar lipids included phosphatidylethanolamine, two unidentified aminophospholipids, two unidentified phospholipids and four unidentified lipids. Menaquinone 6 (MK-6) was the predominant respiratory quinone. The DNA G + C content of strain AK20(T) was 38.8 mol%. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences revealed that strain AK20(T) was closely related to Formosa spongicola A2(T) and Bizionia paragorgiae KMM 6029(T) (pair-wise sequence similarities of 95.9 and 95.7 %, respectively), forming a distinct branch within the family Flavobacteriaceae and clustering with the clade comprising species of the genus Bizionia. Based on phenotypic and chemotaxonomic characteristics and phylogenetic analysis, strain AK20(T) is different from the existing genera in the family Flavobacteriaceae, and is therefore considered to represent a novel species of a new genus, for which the name Xanthomarina gelatinilytica gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain of Xanthomarina gelatinilytica is AK20(T) (=MTCC 11705(T) =JCM 18821(T)).