"Candidatus Thiobios zoothamnicoli," an ectosymbiotic bacterium covering the giant marine ciliate Zoothamnium niveum.

ABSTRACT: Zoothamnium niveum is a giant, colonial marine ciliate from sulfide-rich habitats obligatorily covered with chemoautotrophic, sulfide-oxidizing bacteria which appear as coccoid rods and rods with a series of intermediate shapes. Comparative 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis and fluorescence in situ hybridization showed that the ectosymbiont of Z. niveum belongs to only one pleomorphic phylotype. The Z. niveum ectosymbiont is only moderately related to previously identified groups of thiotrophic symbionts within the Gammaproteobacteria, and shows highest 16S rRNA sequence similarity with the free-living sulfur-oxidizing bacterial strain ODIII6 from shallow-water hydrothermal vents of the Mediterranean Sea (94.5%) and an endosymbiont from a deep-sea hydrothermal vent gastropod of the Indian Oc

SUBMITTER: Rinke C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1393213 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature