Dietzia cinnamea

Environment Samples of this organism have been extracted from petroleum contaminated soil characterized in acidic sandy loam Cambisol soil in a protected habitat in Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil as well as the perianal swab from a patient with a bone marrow transplant (Yassin, 2006; von der Weid, 2006). Multiple strains of Dietzia have been found in soil, deep sea sediment, and soda lakes (Gerday & Glansdorff, 2007).

Description and Significance Dietzia cinnamea is rod shaped in the medical swab while the P4 strain from the soil samples produces a coccoid shape. The organism forms smooth, yellow to orange colonies on agar plates and is single or arranges in small connected colonies. It is gram positive and not acid-fast. It displays snapping division, which is the binary fission resulting in an angular or a palisade arrangement of cells, which is characteristic of the genera Arthrobacter and Corynebacterium.which is the alignment of produces V-forms.

D. cinnamea is capable of degrading a range of petroleum hydrocarbons which can have beneficial environmental implications in today’s world. Other genera that have hydrocarbon degrading strains include Mycobacterium, Rhodococcus, and Dietzia. The strain P4 was found to degrade