Species of bacterium
Flavobacterium akiainvivens, or koʻohonua ʻili akia,[3] (literally "ʻākia bark bacteria") is a species of gram-negative bacteria in the Flavobacteriaceae family. The specific epithet akiainvivens is Latin (akia in vivens) and literally means "living on or in ʻākia."[1] It was isolated originally from decaying wood of the endemic Hawai'ian shrub ʻākia (Wikstroemia oahuensis).
Flavobacterium akiainvivens was discovered by Iris Kuo when she was just a high school student at ʻIolani School.[4] She and her coauthors determined that it shares a clade with Flavobacterium rivuli and Flavobacterium subsaxonicum.[1]
Description
Grown on R2a agar, colonies are off-white or cream, around 2-3mm in diameter, mucoid and translucent.[1] Cells are gram-negative 0.4 by 2 µm rods. The cells are without any gliding motility[1] and the genome revealed no flagella or chemotaxis systems.[5] It is catalase-positive, oxidase-negative, and can not reduce nitrate.[1] The species expresses caseinase, lipase, and amylase, but can digest neither cellulose nor DNA.[1] It can grow both aerobically and microaerophilically but not anaerobically.[1] The primary carotenoid is zeaxanthin, but it does not have any flexirubin-type pigments.[1] The DNA G+C content for the type strain is 44.2 mol%.[1]
State microbe status
In early 2013, state representative James Tokioka submitted HB 293 HD1 to establish F. akiainvivens as the state microbe of Hawaiʻi.[4] At the time, no other U.S. states had a microorganism as a state symbol.[4] However, on 29 May 2013 Oregon officially designated Saccharomyces cerevisiae as the official microbe of the state,[6] making it the first in the nation.[7] Meanwhile, the Hawaiʻian legislation was deferred for a year when it encountered competition from Senator Glenn Wakai's SB3124 proposing Aliivibrio fischeri.[3] In 2017, legislation similar to the original 2013 F. akiainvivens bill was submitted in the Hawaiʻi House of Representatives by Isaac Choy[8] and in the Hawaiʻi Senate by Brian Taniguchi.[9]
