Sphingobacterium gobiense sp. nov., isolated from soil of the Gobi Desert

Abstract

A Gram-stain-negative, short rod-shaped, non-motile, non-spore-forming bacterial strain, designated H7T, was isolated from the Gobi desert, Xinjiang Province of China. The temperature, NaCl and pH ranges for growth were 8–40 °C (optimum 30 °C), 0–5 % (w/v) NaCl and pH 6–10 (optimum pH 7), respectively. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences revealed that strain H7T belonged to the genus Sphingobacterium and showed highest sequence similarity (91 %) to Sphingobacterium composti DSM 18850. The genomic DNA G+C content was 44.3 mol%. MK-7 was identified as the predominant respiratory quinone. Strain H7T contained C16 : 1ω7c and/or C16 : 1ω6c, iso-C15 : 0 and iso-C17 : 0 3-OH as major fatty acids. These data support the affiliation of strain H7T to the genus Sphingobacterium while phenotypic data indicated it is a representative strain of a novel species for which the name Sphingobacterium gobiense sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is H7T ( = ACCC 05757T = KCTC 32293T).