Kangiella spongicola sp. nov., a halophilic marine bacterium isolated from the sponge Chondrilla nucula

A novel halophilic bacterium of the genus Kangiella was isolated from a marine sponge collected from the Florida Keys, USA. Strain A79(T), an aerobic, Gram-negative, non-motile, rod-shaped bacterium, grew in 2-15% (w/v) NaCl, at a temperature of 10-49 degrees C and at pH 4.5-10. Phylogenetic analysis placed strain A79(T) in the family Alcanivoraceae in the class Gammaproteobacteria. Strain A79(T) showed 98.5% 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity to Kangiella japonica KMM 3899(T), 96.6% similarity to Kangiella koreensis DSM 16069(T) and 95.6% similarity to Kangiella aquimarina DSM 16071(T). The major cellular fatty acids were iso-C-11:0, iso-C-11:0 3-OH, iso-C-15:0, iso-C-17:0 and iso-C-17:1 omega 9c and the G+C content of the genomic DNA was 44.9 mol%. On the basis of physiological, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic comparisons, strain A79(T) represents a novel species in the genus Kangiella, for which the name Kangiella spongicola sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is A79(T) (=ATCC BAA-2076(T)=DSM 23219(T)).