ABSTRACT
An extremely halotolerant bacterium designated as HPSSN35C was isolated from saline soil of Dwarka beach, India. It exhibited growth over a wide range of NaCl in medium varying from 0 to 6 M. The isolate produced peach-pink pigment above â¼1.3 M NaCl. The culture was characterized using biochemical tests, bioMerieux Staph identification kit, API ID32 Staph system, and Biolog. Due to slow growth and extreme salt tolerance no ID was obtained in Biolog. Antibiotic sensitivity to various antibiotics was tested. Phenotypic characterization showed that it belonged to the novobiocin resistant staphylococci group. Analysis of 16S rRNA gene sequence comparison of 1452 base pairs showed that isolate is closely related to Staphylococcus saprophyticus group with close relationship to Staphylococcus arlettae (99% similarity). The halotolerant S. arlettae described in literature till date have been reported to tolerate 4.5 M NaCl and produce white to yellow pigment. The present study reports for the first time extremely halotolerant S. arlettae exhibiting growth up to â¼6 M NaCl and producing peach-pink pigment above â¼1.3 M NaCl.
