HALOPHILIC ARCHAEA OF HALOFERAX GENUS ISOLATED FROM ANTHROPOCENTRIC TELEGA (PALADA) SALT LAKE

The paper deals with characterization of some extremely halophilic archaea isolated from surface water samples taken from Telega (Palada) salt lake, located in Prahova county, Romania. Taxonomic investigations have been conducted for several strains isolated in media with a high salt concentration. Salt deposit from Telega (formed in Neogen period) is located underground in the village with the same name in Prahova county. The area is a hillock of sub-Carpathian Mountain from which salt was extracted from antiquity until to the end of 18 th century. The salt is a mixture of crystals with color varying from white until to grey and swarthy. Starting with 1872 some of the salt exploitations were relinquished and resulted in the appearance of various salt lakes from which Palada (Telega) lake have depth of 36 m, salinity around 160 g/L and pH value around 8.3. The water is also rich in calcium, magnesium and potassium. The characterization of the isolates from Telega salt lake by polyphasic approach revealed that they belonged to the genus Haloferax. The investigation revealed a low diversity of this salt lake, dominated by haloarchaea.