Nocardioides albertanoniae sp. nov., isolated from Roman catacombs

Abstract

A Gram-reaction-positive, aerobic, non-spore-forming, rod- or coccoid-shaped, strain, CD40127(T), was isolated from a green biofilm covering the wall of the Domitilla Catacombs in Rome, Italy. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences revealed that strain CD40127(T) belongs to the genus Nocardioides, closely related to Nocardioides luteus DSM 43366(T) and Nocardioides albus DSM 43109(T) with 98.86 % and 98.01 % similarity values, respectively. Strain CD40127(T) exhibited 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity values below 96.29 % with the rest of the species of the genus Nocardioides. The G+C content of the genomic DNA was 69.7 mol%. The predominant fatty acid was iso-C16 : 0 and the major menaquinone was MK-8(H4) in accordance with the phenotypes of other species of the genus Nocardioides. A polyphasic approach using physiological tests, fatty acid profiles, DNA base ratios and DNA-DNA hybridization showed that isolate CD40127(T) represents a novel species within the genus Nocardioides, for which the name Nocardioides albertanoniae is proposed. The type strain is CD40127(T) ( = DSM 25218(T) = CECT 8014(T)).