The cellular fatty acid composition was determined for 53 strains of acetic acid bacteria by gas-liquid chromatography. The representatives of the genera
Gluconobacter and
Acetobacter contained the straight-chain unsaturated acid of C
18:1 as a major constituent. Other acids were the straight-chain saturated acids of C
16:0 and C
18:0 and unidentified acids. The genus
Acetobacter was discriminated from the genus
Gluconobacter by the former having a detectable amount of the straight-chain saturated acid of C
14:0 under experimental conditions. In contrast, the polarly flagellated intermediate strains represented the cellular fatty acid profiles composed of the iso-branched chain acid of C
15:0. These results are discussed in connection with the ubiquinone system. The cellular fatty acid composition is proposed here as a novel criterion for characterizing acetic acid bacteria, especially the polarly flagellated intermediate, or
A. aurantius.
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