Halomonas urumqiensis sp. nov., a moderately halophilic bacterium isolated from a saline-alkaline lake

A moderately halophilic, aerobic bacterium, strain BZ-SZ-XJ27T, belonging to the genus Halomonas, was isolated from a saline-alkaline lake in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences and a multilocus sequence analysis using the 16S rRNA, gyrB and rpoD genes demonstrated that strain BZ-SZ-XJ27T represents a member of the genus Halomonas. On the basis of 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity, the closest relatives were Halomonas campaniensis 5AGT, H. fontilapidosi 5CRT, H. korlensis XK1T and H. sinaiensis ALO SharmT, with similarities of 96.2-97.2 %. DNA-DNA hybridization with H. korlensis CGMCC 1.6981T (the nearest phylogenetic neighbour) and H. campaniensis DSM 15293T (the highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity) showed relatedness values of 53 and 38 %, respectively, demonstrating the separateness of the three taxa. The bacterium stained Gram-negative and the cells were motile and rod-shaped. The strain formed creamy-white colonies and grew under optimal conditions of 1.42 M Na+ (range 0.22-4.32 M Na+), pH 8.0-8.5 (range pH 6.0-10.0) and 39 °C (range 4-43 °C). The dominant fatty acids were summed feature 8 (C18 : 1ω7c/C18 : 1ω6c; 36.6 %), C16 : 0 (25.9 %) and summed feature 3 (C16 : 1ω7c/C16 : 1ω6c; 21.2 %). The dominant polar lipids were two unknown phospholipids, phosphatidylethanolamine and phosphatidylglycerol, and the main respiratory quinones were ubiquinone 9 (Q-9; 89 %) and ubiquinone 8 (Q-8; 10 %). The genomic DNA G+C content was 61.7 ± 0.8 mol% (Tm). On the basis of phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic features, strain BZ-SZ-XJ27T is proposed to represent a novel species, Halomonas urumqiensis sp. nov., within the genus Halomonas of the family Halomonadaceae. The type strain is BZ-SZ-XJ27T ( = JCM 30202T = CGMCC 1.12917T).