Chryseobacterium angstadtii sp. nov., isolated from a newt tank

Abstract

As part of an undergraduate microbiology course, a yellow–orange-pigmented, Gram-staining negative, rod-shaped, non-motile bacterial strain was isolated from a glass tank housing several red-spotted newts (Notophthalmus viridescens). The sequence of the 16S rRNA gene of this strain, designated KMT, was 97.4–98.0 % similar to those of the type strains of Chryseobacterium luteum , C. shigense and C. vrystaatense , while the similarity levels for protein-coding genes were less than 94.7 % for rpoB, less than 92.1 % for groEL and less than 87.1 % for gyrB. These values are lower than for many other established distinct species. Polyphasic characterization and comparison to these relatives revealed that strain KMT was similar to other Chryseobacterium strains in that it contained MK-6 as its major respiratory quinone and phosphatidylethanolamine as the most abundant polar lipid, produced flexirubin-type pigments, oxidase and catalase and primarily contained the fatty acids iso-C15 : 0, iso-C17 : 1ω9c, iso-C17 : 0 3-OH and summed feature 3 (comprising C16 : 1ω6c and/or C16 : 1ω7c). Based on the results of this study, strain KMT represents a novel species, for which the name Chryseobacterium angstadtii sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is KMT ( = ATCC BAA-2160T = NRRL B-59516T = KCTC 23297T).