A novel bacterial species, designated FBL11T, was isolated from salted shrimp jeotgal, a traditional Korean fermented food sampled in the Republic of Korea. This strain showed the highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity to Psychrobacter halodurans strain F2608T (NR_181578.1) at 98.3%. The genome size of strain FBL11T was 3,294,493 bp with a G+C content of 42.5 mol%. Computation of relatedness indicates that strain FBL11T shares the highest relatedness of 78.5% with Psychrobacter fulvigenes strain KC-40T (NZ_CAJGZP01) and 25.2% with Psychrobacter piechaudii strain CIP110854T (NZ_FUGE01), with values clearly below the cut-offs for species distinction. Polyphasic characterization using biochemical tests and matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight MS analysis confirmed these findings. Strain FBL11T grew at 10-30 °C (optimum, 20-30 °C) with 0-15% NaCl (w/v; optimum, 3-6%). Analysis of biosynthetic gene clusters responsible for secondary metabolite production revealed that strain FBL11T generates unique products such as beta-lactone and redox-cofactors within this genus. Based on the genomic and phenotypic data obtained, we propose that strain FBL11T represents a novel species, for which we propose the name Psychrobacter saeujeotis sp. nov. (type strain FBL11T=KACC 23745T=KCTC 8655T=JCM 37231T).
Keywords: Psychrobacter saeujeotis; marine species; novel species; salted fermented shrimp.