Metagenomic and culture-dependent analysis of Rhinopithecius bieti gut microbiota and characterization of a novel genus of Sphingobacteriaceae.

Culture-dependent and metagenomic binning techniques were employed to gain an insight into the diversification of gut bacteria in Rhinopithecius bieti, a highly endangered primate endemic to China. Our analyses revealed that Bacillota_A and Bacteroidota were the dominant phyla. These two phyla species are rich in carbohydrate active enzymes, which could provide nutrients and energy for their own or hosts' survival under different circumstances. Among the culturable bacteria, one novel bacterium, designated as WQ 2009, formed a distinct branch that had a low similarity to the known species in the family Sphingobacteriaceae, based on the phylogenetic analysis of its 16S rRNA gene sequence or phylogenomic analysis. The ANI, dDDH and AAI values between WQ 2009 and its most closely related strains S. kitahiroshimense 10C, S. pakistanense NCCP-246 and S. faecium DSM 11690 were significantly lower than the accepted cut-off values for microbial species delineation. All results demonstrated that WQ 2009 represent a novel genus, for which names Rhinopithecimicrobium gen. nov. and Rhinopithecimicrobium faecis sp. nov. (Type strain WQ 2009 = CCTCC AA 2021153 = KCTC 82941) are proposed.