Halomonas tabrizica sp. nov., a novel moderately halophilic bacterium isolated from Urmia Lake in Iran

A novel moderately halophilic, Gram-stain negative and aerobic bacterium, designated strain TBZ21 T , was isolated from a water sample of Urmia Lake, Iran. Cells were observed to be non-motile rods with no flagellum, showing positive catalase and oxidase reactions. Strain TBZ21 T was found to grow at 10–40 °C (optimum, 30 °C), at pH 7–10 (optimum, pH 8) and in the presence of 1–22% (optimum, 10%). The major fatty acids were identified as C 19:0 cyclo ω 8 c , C 16:0 , Summed features 3 (C 13:0 3-OH and/or iso-C 15:1 H) and 8 (C 18:1 ω 7 c and/or C 18:1 ω 6 c ) and C 12:0 3-OH. The major polar lipids were identified as diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine and an unidentified phosphoaminolipid. The genomic DNA G+C content of strain TBZ21 T was determined to be 63.3 mol%. Phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that strain TBZ21 T belongs to the genus Halomonas , and shows high sequence similarities to Halomonas fontilapidosi 5CR T (99.43%), Halomonas ventosae AL12 T (98.64%), Halomonas sediminicola CPS11 T (98.63%) and Halomonas aestuarii Hb3 T (98.08%), and has low similarities (below 98.0%) with other members of the genus. The values of DNA–DNA relatedness between strain TBZ21 T and the closely related strains H. fontilapidosi LMG 24455 T and H. ventosae LMG 26187 T were 42 ± 11% and 54 ± 16%, respectively. On the basis of phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and molecular characteristics, strain TBZ21 T is concluded to represent a novel species of the genus Halomonas , for which the name Halomonas tabrizica sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is TBZ21 T (=LMG 25445 T =DSM 23018 T ).