Vibrio neptunius sp nov., Vibrio brasiliensis sp nov and Vibrio xuii sp nov., isolated from the marine aquaculture environment (bivalves, fish, rotifers and shrimps)

The fluorescent amplified fragment length polymorphism (FAFLP) groups A5 (21 isolates), AB (6 isolates) and A23 (3 isolates) distinguished in an earlier paper(Thompson etal., Syst Appl Microbiol 24, 520-538, 2001) were examined in more depth. These three groups were phylogenetically related to Vibrio tubiashii, but DNA-DNA hybridization experiments proved that the three AFLP groups are in fact novel species. Chemotaxonomic and phenotypic analyses further revealed several differences among the 30 isolates and known Vibrio species. It is proposed to accommodate these isolates in three novel species, namely Vibrio neptunius (type strain LMG 20536(T); EMBL accession no. AJ316171; G + C content of the type strain 46.0 mol%), Vibric, brasiliensis (type strain LMG 20546 T; EMBL accession no. AJ316172; G + C content of the type strain 45.9 mol%) and Vibrioxuii (type strain LMG 21346(T); EMBL accession no. AJ316181; G + C content of the type strain 46.6 mol%). These species can be differentiated on the basis of phenotypic features, including fatty acid composition (particularly 14:0 iso, 14:0 iso 3-OH, 16: 0 iso, 16:0, 17:0 and 17:1 omega8c), enzyme activities and utilization and fermentation of various carbon sources.