Vibrio gallicus sp. nov., isolated from the gut of the French abalone Haliotis tuberculata.

Five alginolytic, facultatively anaerobic, non-motile bacteria were isolated from the gut of the abalone Haliotis tuberculata. Phylogenetic analyses based on 16S rDNA data indicated that these strains are related to Vibrio wodanis, Vibrio salmonicida, Vibrio logei and Vibrio fischeri (but with <97 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity). DNA-DNA hybridization and fluorescence amplified fragment length polymorphism fingerprinting demonstrated that the five strains constituted a single species that was different from all currently known vibrios. The name Vibrio gallicus sp. nov. (type strain, CIP 107863(T)=LMG 21878(T)=HT2-1(T); DNA G+C content, 43.6-44.3 mol%) is proposed for this novel taxon. Several phenotypic features were disclosed that discriminated V. gallicus from other Vibrio species: V. gallicus can be differentiated from Vibrio halioticoli on the basis of four traits (beta-galactosidase test and assimilation of three carbon compounds) and from Vibrio superstes by 16 traits.