Chitinophaga taiwanensis sp. nov., isolated from the rhizosphere of Arabidopsis thaliana.

An aerobic, Gram-stain-negative, rod-shaped bacterium (strain CC-ALB-1(T)) was isolated from the rhizosphere of Arabidopsis thaliana. Strain CC-ALB-1(T) was able to grow at 20-30 °C, pH 5.0-8.0 and with up to 1.0% (w/v) NaCl. 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis showed that strain CC-ALB-1(T) had the highest sequence similarity to Chitinophaga ginsengisegetis Gsoil 040(T) (96.9%) and Chitinophaga niastensis JS16-4(T) (96.7%); lower levels of similarity (<97.0%) were observed to strains of all other species of the genus Chitinophaga. The fatty acid profile consisted of iso-C(15 : 0), iso-C(17 : 0) 3-OH, C(15 : 1)ω5c, C(16 : 1)ω5c and summed feature 3 (C(16 : 1)ω7c and/or C(16 : 1)ω6c). The polar lipid profile contained phosphatidylethanolamine, two unidentified aminolipids and five unidentified lipids. The predominant quinone system was menaquinone 7 (MK-7). The DNA G+C content was 53.4 ± 0.4 mol%. Based on its phylogenetic, phenotypic and chemotaxonomic features, strain CC-ALB-1(T) is proposed to represent a novel species within the genus Chitinophaga, for which the name Chitinophaga taiwanensis sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is CC-ALB-1(T) ( = BCRC 80570(T) = JCM 18895(T)).