Sporosarcina macmurdoensis sp. nov., from a cyanobacterial mat sample from a pond in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica

1 Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Uppal Road, Hyderabad 500 007, India 2 Department of Environmental and Information Science, Otsuma Women's University, Tamashi, Tokyo 206, Japan Correspondence S. Shivaji shivas{at}ccmb.res.in Strain CMS 21w T was isolated from a cyanobacterial mat sample taken from a pond located in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica. Based on its phenotypic, chemotaxonomic and phylogenetic properties, strain CMS 21w T was identified as a member of the genus Sporosarcina . At the 16S rRNA gene level, CMS 21w T exhibited about 93–96 % similarity to all reported species of Sporosarcina and exhibited a maximum similarity of 96 % to both Sporosarcina globispora and Sporosarcina psychrophila . Based on more than 3 % difference at the 16S rRNA gene sequence level and the presence of distinct differences with respect to phenotypic, biochemical and chemotaxonomic features, strain CMS 21w T (=MTCC 4670 T =DSM 15428 T =CIP 107784 T ) is proposed as the type strain of a novel species of Sporosarcina , Sporosarcina macmurdoensis sp. nov. Published online ahead of print on 7 February 2003 as DOI 10.1099/ijs.0.02628-0. The EMBL/GenBank/DDBJ accession number for the 16S rRNA gene sequence of strain CMS 21w T is AJ514408 .