Paenibacillus shenyangensis sp. nov., a bioflocculant-producing species isolated from soil under a peach tree.

A Gram-stain-positive, aerobic or facultatively anaerobic, rod-shaped, non-motile, endospore-forming bacterium, strain A9(T), was isolated in 1996 from a soil sample collected under a peach tree in Qingnian Park in Shenyang, PR China, and its taxonomic position was investigated using a polyphasic approach. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences showed that the strain belonged to the genus Paenibacillus, and was most closely related to the type strain of Paenibacillus hunanensis with a 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity of 96.7 % and a DNA-DNA relatedness value of 51.6 %. The major polar lipids of strain A9(T) were diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylethanolamine. The predominant menaquinone was MK-7 and the major cellular fatty acids were anteiso-C15 : 0, C16 : 0 and iso-C15 : 0. The DNA G+C content was 51.9 mol%. Based on these results, it is concluded that strain A9(T) represents a novel species of the genus Paenibacillus, for which the name Paenibacillus shenyangensis sp. nov. is proposed, with A9(T) ( = JCM 19307(T) = CGMCC 2040(T)) as the type strain.