A.re.ni.bac'ter. L. fem. n. arena sand; N.L. masc. n. bacter rod; N.L. masc. n. Arenibacter sand-dwelling rod.

Bacteroidetes / Flavobacteriia / Flavobacteriales / Flavobacteriaceae / Arenibacter

The genus Arenibacter, a member of the family Flavobacteriaceae, was proposed to accommodate Gram-negative, strictly aerobic, chemoorganotrophic, nongliding, and catalase- and oxidase-positive bacteria. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicates that the close relatives of the type strains of the genus Arenibacter are members of the family Flavobacteriaceae such as Spongiimicrobium, Kriegella, Maribacter, and Zobellia with sequence similarity ranges of 92.2–92.9, 91.6–93.0, 90.8–93.5, and 91.0–92.7%, respectively. On marine agar, Arenibacter species form regular, round, low-convex, shiny, and dark-orange colonies with a diameter of 1–3 mm after 48 h at 28°C. Growth occurs with 0–10.0% NaCl at pH 5.5–10.0 and at 4–42°C. The optimal growth is observed at 23–30°C at pH 7.0–8.5 and with 0.5–4% NaCl. Arenibacter strains cannot hydrolyze agar, alginic acids, chitin, starch, or Tween 80. The predominant cellular fatty acids are C_15:0, iso-C_15:0, iso-C_15:1 G, iso-C_17:0 3-OH, and summed feature 3, comprising C_15:0 iso 2-OH and/or C_16:1 ω7c fatty acids. The major respiratory quinone is MK-6. The main polar lipid is phosphatidylethanolamine. The DNA G + C content is 37–40 mol%. At the time of writing, the genus Arenibacter comprises seven validly named species which were isolated from the different marine environments including sediments, seaweeds, and echinoderms. The type species of the genus is Arenibacter latericius. The Arenibacter species possess 16S rRNA gene sequence similarities to one another that range from 93.9 to 99.7%. The DNA–DNA relatedness between the type strains of the Arenibacter species is 9.1–62%.

DNA G + C content (mol%): 37–40 (T _m and HPLC).

Type species: Arenibacter latericius Ivanova, Nedashkovskaya, Chun, Lysenko, Frolova, Svetashev, Vysotskii, Mikhailov, Huq and Colwell 2001, 1994^VP, emend. Nedashkovskaya, Vancanneyt, Cleenwerck, Snauwaert, Kim, Lysenko, Shevchenko, Lee, Park, Frolova, Mikhailov, Bae and Swings 2006, 159.