Glaciecola agarilytica sp. nov., an agar-digesting marine bacterium from the East Sea, Korea

Abstract

A taxonomic study was carried out on an isolate, strain NO2T, from marine sediment collected from the East Sea, Korea. Comparative 16S rRNA gene sequence studies showed that this strain belonged to the Gammaproteobacteria and was most closely related to Glaciecola mesophila KMM 241T and Glaciecola polaris LMG 21857T (98.6 and 98.0 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity, respectively). The isolate was Gram-negative, aerobic and slightly halophilic and grew in 2–8 % NaCl and at 7–30 °C. Strain NO2T shared some physiological and biochemical properties with G. mesophila KMM 241T and G. polaris LMG 21857T. The G+C content of the genomic DNA of strain NO2T was 45 mol%. Strain NO2T possessed C16 : 0, summed feature 4 (C16 : 1 ω7c and/or iso-C15 : 0 2-OH) and summed feature 7 (C18 : 1 ω9c/ω12t/ω7c) as the major cellular fatty acids. DNA–DNA relatedness data indicated that strain NO2T represents a distinct species that is separate from G. mesophila and G. polaris. On the basis of polyphasic evidence, it is proposed that strain NO2T (=KCTC 12755T=LMG 23762T) represents the type strain of a novel species, Glaciecola agarilytica sp. nov.