Skermanella mucosa sp. nov., isolated from crude oil contaminated soil

A novel Gram-stain negative, small rod-shaped bacterium (strain 8-14-6^T) was isolated from hydrocarbon contaminated desert soil collected from Kuwait. Strain 8-14-6^T grew at 5-37 °C, pH 6.0-8.8 and 0-2% (w/v) of NaCl concentration. Casein, starch, Tween 20 and Tween 80 were hydrolyzed while urea, chitin, DNA and carboxymethyl-cellulose were not hydrolyzed by strain 8-14-6^T. The major cellular fatty acids were identified as C_18:1ω6c/C_18:1ω7c, C_16:0 and iso-C_16:1I/C_14:03-OH. Strain 8-14-6^T produced diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylcholine, an unidentified phospholipids, two unidentified lipids and five unidentified amino lipids as polar lipids. Genomic G+C content was 73.5 mol %. 16S rRNA gene sequence comparisons indicated that strain 8-14-6^T represents a member of the genus Skermanella within family Rhodospirillaceae of the class Alphaproteobacteria. Strain 8-14-6^T has a sequence similarity of 98.9% with Skermanella rosea M1^T, 97.4% with Skermanella aerolata 5416T-32^T, 96.9% with Skermanella stibiiresistens SB22^T and <95.4% with the other two known species of the genus Skermanella. The DNA-DNA relatedness values between strain 8-14-6^T and the type strains of the closely related species were clearly below the 70% threshold. From the combination of phenotypic and genotypic characteristics and distinct phylogenetic position, the strain is considered to represent a novel species of the genus Skermanella, for which the name Skermanella mucosa sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is 8-14-6^T (=KEMB 2255-438^T =JCM 31590^T).