Tessaracoccus flavescens sp. nov., isolated from marine sediment

A novel actinobacterium, designated strain SST-39T, was isolated from a marine sediment sample collected in Jeju, Republic of Korea. Cells were facultatively anaerobic, Gram-positive, non-endospore-forming, non-motile rods. Colonies were circular, slightly convex, opaque and brilliant yellow. The cell-wall peptidoglycan of the organism contained ll-diaminopimelic acid as the diagnostic diamino acid. Polar lipids included phosphatidylglycerol and diphosphatidylglycerol. The predominant menaquinone was MK-9(H4). The major cellular fatty acids were anteiso-C15 : 0, C18 : 0 and C16 : 0. The DNA G+C content was 68.4 mol%. A phylogenetic tree based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that the isolate belonged to the family Propionibacteriaceae and formed a unique cluster with the type strain of Tessaracoccus bendigoensis (97.0 % sequence similarity). Other phylogenetic neighbours were the type strains of Luteococcus peritonei (95.1 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity) and Propionibacterium propionicum (95.1 %). On the basis of its phenotypic and phylogenetic distinctiveness, strain SST-39T is considered to represent a novel species of the genus Tessaracoccus, for which the name Tessaracoccus flavescens sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is SST-39T (=DSM 18582T =KCTC 19196T).