Alteromonas sediminis sp. nov., isolated from sediment in a sea cucumber culture pond.

A novel strain, U0105, was isolated from marine sediment of the coast of Weihai, China. The bacterium was aerobic, Gram-stain-negative, oxidase-positive, catalase-positive, rod-shaped and motile. Growth was observed at salinities of 1.0-6.0 % (w/v) NaCl (optimum with 2.0-3.0 %), temperatures of 20-40 °C (optimum at 37 °C) and pH of 6.5-9.5 (optimum at pH 7.0-7.5). The isolate could not reduce nitrate to nitrite. It could hydrolyse starch and Tweens 20, 40 and 60, but not casein or cellulose. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that strain U0105 belonged to the genus Alteromonas, with highest sequence similarity to Alteromonas aestuariivivens KCTC 52655 (97.1 %). The average nucleotide identity value and the digital DNA-DNA hybridization value between strain U0105 and A. aestuariivivens KCTC 52655 were 69.2 % and 21.2 %, respectively. Strain U0105 was found to contain Q-8 as the sole menaquinone and summed feature 3 (C16 : 1ω7c and/or C16 : 1ω6c), C16 : 0 and C18 : 1ω7c as the major fatty acids. The major polar lipids were identified as phosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylethanolamine. The G+C content of the chromosomal DNA was 45.3 mol%. The combined genotypic and phenotypic data show that strain U0105 represents a novel species of the genus Alteromonas, for which the name Alteromonas sediminis sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is U0105 (=KCTC 62080=MCCC 1H00299).