Altererythrobacter spongiae sp. nov., a novel member of the genus Altererythrobacter isolated from marine sponge.

A taxonomic study was carried out on strain HN-Y73, which was isolated from sponge collected from Yangpu Bay, Hainan, PR China. Strain HN-Y73 was Gram-stain-negative, non-motile, ovoid- to rod-shaped, yellow-pigmented and could grow at 10-42 °C (optimum, 28 °C), at pH 5.0-9.0 (pH 8.0) and in 0.5-16 % (w/v) NaCl (3-4 %). This isolate was positive for oxidase, catalase and the hydrolysis of aesculin and xylan, but negative for the hydrolysis of casein and gelatin. Strain HN-Y73 shared the highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity with Altererythrobacter endophyticus BR75 (96.9 %), followed by Altererythrobacter estronivorus MH-B5 (96.0 %), Altererythrobacter indicus MSSRF26 (95.9 %) and Altererythrobacter mangrovi C9-11 (95.7 %). The phylogenetic tree showed that strain HN-Y73 forms a clade with A. endophyticus BR75, A. indicus MSSRF26 and A. estronivorus MH-B5 within the genus Altererythrobacter. The dominant fatty acids were summed feature 8 (C18 : 1ω7c/ω6c) and C19 : 0cyclo ω8c. The major polar lipids comprised phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylglycerol, diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylcholine, sphingoglycolipid phosphatidyldimethylethanolamine, phosphatidylmonomethylethanolamine, one unidentified glycolipid, two unidentified phospholipids and four unidentified lipids. The respiratory lipoquinone was identified as Q-10. The G+C content of the genomic DNA was 57.6 mol%. Based on the phenotypic and phylogenetic data, strain HN-Y73 represents a novel species of the genus Altererythrobacter, for which the name Altererythrobacter spongiae sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is HN-Y73 (=MCCC 1K03324=LMG 30461).