Halolamina litorea sp. nov., a haloarchaeon isolated from a marine solar saltern

Abstract

Objective A halophilic archaeal strain YJ-41T was isolated from Yangjiang marine solar saltern in the south region of China. In the present work, strain YJ-41T was characterized in detail to elucidate its taxonomic position. Methods The taxonomic status of strain YJ-41T was studied by using a polyphasic taxonomic method including determining phenotype, chemotype and genotype. Results Cells of strain YJ-41T were rod-shaped, Gram-staining negative and formed red-pigmented colonies on agar plates. Strain YJ-41T was able to grow between 20 and 50 °C (optimum 37 °C), 2.1 to 4.8 mol/L NaCl (optimum 3.1 mol/L), 0 to 1.0 mol/L MgCl2 (optimum 0.05 mol/L) and pH 5.0 to 9.0 (optimum 7.0). Cells lysed in distilled water, and the minimal NaCl concentration required to prevent cell-lysis was 10% (W/V). The major polar lipids of the strain were phosphatidic acid, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol phosphate methyl ester, phosphatidylglycerol sulfate and eight glycolipids; three of these glycolipids chromatographically identical to sulfated mannosyl glucosyl diether, galactosyl mannosy glucosyl diether and mannosyl glucosyl diether. The 16S rRNA and rpoB′ genes of strain YJ-41T were phylogenetically related to the corresponding genes of Halolamina members (97.5% to 98.4% and 93.1% to 94.4% similarities, respectively). The DNA G+C content of strain YJ-41T was 61.4 mol%. Conclusion The phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic properties suggested that strain YJ-41T (=CGMCC 1.12859T=JCM 30237T) represents a new species of Halolamina, for which the name Halolamina litorea sp. nov. is proposed.