Pedobacter seoulensis sp. nov., isolated from soil of a bamboo field

A Gram-stain negative, strictly aerobic, motile by gliding, rod-shaped and yellow pigmented strain THG-G12^T was isolated from soil of a bamboo field in Seoul, Republic of Korea. Strain THG-G12^T was observed to grow well at 20–28 °C and pH 7.0–7.5 in the absence of NaCl on nutrient agar. Based on 16S rRNA gene sequence comparisons, strain THG-G12^T was found to be most closely related to Pedobacter ginsengisoli Gsoil 104^T (97.5 % sequence similarity), Pedobacter steynii WB2.3-45^T (97.4 %), Pedobacter metabolipauper WB2.3-71^T (97.2 %), Pedobacter nyackensis NWG-II14^T (97.2 %), Pedobacter caeni LMG 22862^T (97.1 %) and Pedobacter duraquae WB2.1-25^T (97.0 %), but DNA relatedness between strain THG-G12^T and its phylogenetically closest neighbours was below 9.5 %. The G+C content of the genomic DNA was determined to be 39.9 mol%. The only isoprenoid quinone detected in strain THG-G12^T was menaquinone-7 (MK-7). The major component in the polyamine pattern was sym-homospermidine. The major polar lipids were found to be phosphatidylethanolamine, unidentified phosphoglycolipids, unidentified aminophosphoglycolipids, unidentified aminolipids and unidentified lipids. Strain THG-G12^T showed the presence of two ceramide phosphorylethanolamines (CerPE-2′ and CerPE-2″), dihydrosphingosines and an unidentified ceramide as the major ceramide. The major fatty acids were identified as summed feature 3 (as defined by the MIDI system; C_16:1 ω7c and/or C_16:1 ω6c) and iso-C_15:0. These data support the affiliation of strain THG-G12^T to the genus Pedobacter. The results of physiological and biochemical tests enabled strain THG-G12^T to be differentiated genotypically and phenotypically from the recognized species of the genus Pedobacter. Therefore, the novel isolate represents a novel species, for which the name Pedobacter seoulensis sp. nov. is proposed, with THG-G12^T as the type strain (=KACC 17529^T =JCM 19363^T).