Lactobacillus heilongjiangensis sp. nov., isolated from Chinese pickle.

A Gram-stain-positive bacterial strain, S4-3(T), was isolated from traditional pickle in Heilongjiang Province, China. The bacterium was characterized by a polyphasic approach, including 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis, pheS gene sequence analysis, rpoA gene sequence analysis, dnaK gene sequence analysis, fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) analysis, determination of DNA G+C content, DNA-DNA hybridization and an analysis of phenotypic features. Strain S4-3(T) showed 97.9-98.7 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarities, 84.4-94.1 % pheS gene sequence similarities and 94.4-96.9 % rpoA gene sequence similarities to the type strains of Lactobacillus nantensis, Lactobacillus mindensis, Lactobacillus crustorum, Lactobacillus futsaii, Lactobacillus farciminis and Lactobacillus kimchiensis. dnaK gene sequence similarities between S4-3(T) and Lactobacillus nantensis LMG 23510(T), Lactobacillus mindensis LMG 21932(T), Lactobacillus crustorum LMG 23699(T), Lactobacillus futsaii JCM 17355(T) and Lactobacillus farciminis LMG 9200(T) were 95.4, 91.5, 90.4, 91.7 and 93.1 %, respectively. Based upon the data obtained in the present study, a novel species, Lactobacillus heilongjiangensis sp. nov., is proposed and the type strain is S4-3(T) ( = LMG 26166(T) = NCIMB 14701(T)).