Lactobacillus satsumensis sp. nov., isolated from mashes of shochu, a traditional Japanese distilled spirit made from fermented rice and other starchy materials.

Gram-positive, rod-shaped, motile lactic acid bacteria (strains NRIC 0603, NRIC 0604T, NRIC 0605 and NRIC 0606) were isolated from shochu mashes using an enrichment culture approach. These strains clustered in the Lactobacillus casei-Pediococcus group and were closely related to Lactobacillus nagelii and Lactobacillus mali on the basis of 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity. Levels of DNA-DNA relatedness revealed genotypic separation of the four isolates from the above two species. The isolates are therefore considered to represent a novel species, for which the name Lactobacillus satsumensis is proposed. The type strain is NRIC 0604T (=JCM 12392T=DSM 16230T).