Spontaneous mutation rate determination in flavobacterial species

Increased mutation rate is known to result in accelerated sequence evolution and genome reduction. However, most marine bacterioplankton lineages with reduced genomes either remain uncultivated or do not grow on solid media, and thus are not suitable for the mutation rate calculation through the MA/WGS methods. Members of Nonlabens and Leeuwenhoekiella grow readily on solid medium and thus are amenable to the MA/WGS procedure, providing an unprecedented opportunity to examine the effect of mutation rate on elevated evolutionary rate and genome reduction in free-living marine bacteria.