Harryflintia acetispora gen. nov., sp. nov., isolated from chicken caecum

More than 100 isolates of a Gram-stain-negative, curved rod-shaped, so far uncultured bacterium were isolated from chicken caecal content. The strains were obligate anaerobes which formed endospores. They were catalase-positive, cytochrome-oxidase-negative and did not hydrolyse aesculin. The detected predominant metabolic end product in reinforced clostridial bedium broth was acetate. The DNA G+C content was 62.2 mol%. The cell fatty acid composition was dominated by C15 : 0 iso, C15 : 0anteiso, C16 : 0, C13 : 0 iso, C14 : 0 iso and C16 : 0DMA. Analysis of the 16S rRNA gene sequences of the novel isolates showed 99 % similarity to each other. Phylogenetically they are placed in Clostridium cluster IV. They exhibited 99 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity to uncultured bacterial clone SJTU_C_03_83 (GenBank accession no. EF404038.1) and to three other so far uncultured strains. The closest related type strains, Hydrogenoanaerobacterium saccharovorans SW51T and Anaerotruncus colihominis WAL 14565T, exhibited a 16S rRNA gene sequence divergence of at least 8 % to the newly described isolates. In addition, morphological and biochemical characteristics allowed differentiation of the novel isolates from these and other related and validly published species, including Clostridium methylpentosum and Acetanaerobacterium elongatum. Therefore, a new genus, Harryflintia gen. nov., is proposed for the isolated hitherto unknown strains with V20-281aT (=DSM 100433T =CECT 8892T) as the type strain of its type species, Harryflintia acetispora gen. nov., sp. nov.