Psychrobium conchae gen. nov., sp. nov., a psychrophilic marine bacterium isolated from the Iheya North hydrothermal field

Abstract

A novel psychrophilic, marine, bacterial strain designated BJ-1T was isolated from the Iheya North hydrothermal field in the Okinawa Trough off Japan. Cells were Gram-negative, rod-shaped, non-spore-forming, aerobic chemo-organotrophs and motile by means of a single polar flagellum. Growth occurred at temperatures below 16 °C, with the optimum between 9 and 12 °C. Phylogenetic analysis based on the 16S rRNA gene sequence indicated that the closest relatives of strain BJ-1T were Shewanella denitrificans OS-217T (93.5 % similarity), Shewanella profunda DSM 15900T (92.9 %), Shewanella gaetbuli TF-27T (92.9 %), Paraferrimonas sedimenticola Mok-106T (92.1 %) and Ferrimonas kyonanensis Asr22-7T (91.7 %). The major respiratory quinone was Q-8. The predominant fatty acids were C16 : 1ω7c and C16 : 0. The G+C content of the novel strain was 40.5 mol%. Based on phylogenetic, phenotypic and chemotaxonomic evidence, it is proposed that strain BJ-1T represents a novel species in a new genus, for which the name Psychrobium conchae gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain of Psychrobium conchae is BJ-1T ( = JCM 30103T = DSM 28701T).