The genomic sequence of Exiguobacterium chiriqhucha str. N139 reveals a species that thrives in cold waters and extreme environmental conditions

ANA GUTIÉRREZ-PRECIADO; OMAR F. ORDOÑEZ; JORGE VALDIVIA-ANISTRO; ANDRÉS MOYA; AMPARO LATORRE; MARIANA REYES-PRIETO; TANIA ROSAS-PÉREZ; ANDRÉS SARALEGUI; MARÍA EUGENIA FARÍAS; CARLOS VARGAS-CHÁVEZ; DIEGO SANTOS-GARCÍA; ERIA A. REBOLLAR; ENRIQUE MERINO; VALERIA SOUZA

PeerJ

Jason Hoyt Peter Binfield

Año: 2016

2167-8359

We report the genome sequence of Exiguobacterium chiriqhucha str. N139, isolated froma high-altitude Andean lake. Comparative genomic analyses of the Exiguobacteriumgenomes available suggest that our strain belongs to the same species as the previouslyreported E. pavilionensis str. RW-2 and Exiguobacterium str. GIC 31. We describethis species and propose the chiriqhucha name to group them. ?Chiri qhucha? inQuechua means ?cold lake?, which is a common origin of these three cosmopolitanExiguobacteria. The 2,952,588-bp E. chiriqhucha str. N139 genome contains onechromosome and three megaplasmids. The genome analysis of the Andean strainsuggests the presence of enzymes that confer E. chiriqhucha str. N139 the ability togrow under multiple environmental extreme conditions, including high concentrationsof different metals, high ultraviolet B radiation, scavenging for phosphorous andcoping with high salinity. Moreover, the regulation of its tryptophan biosynthesissuggests that novel pathways remain to be discovered, and that these pathways might befundamental in the amino acid metabolism of the microbial community from LagunaNegra, Argentina