Table 1. Classification and general features of R. leguminosarum bv. trifolii WSM1325 according to the MIGS recommendations [8].

MIGS ID	Property	Term	Evidence code
	Current classification	Domain Bacteria	TAS [9]
		Phylum Proteobacteria	TAS [10,11]
		Class Alphaproteobacteria	TAS [12,13]
		Order Rhizobiales	TAS [13,14]
		Family Rhizobiaceae	TAS [15,16]
		Genus Rhizobium	TAS [17-19]
		Species Rhizobium leguminosarum	TAS [18,20]
		Biovar trifolii Strain WSM1325
	Gram stain	negative	TAS [17]
	Cell shape	rod	TAS [17]
	Motility	motile	TAS [17]
	Sporulation	non-sporulating	TAS [17]
	Temperature range	mesophile	TAS [17]
	Optimum temperature	28°C	TAS [17]
	Salinity	unknown	TAS [17]
MIGS-22	Oxygen requirement	aerobic	TAS [17]
	Carbon source	glucose, mannitol, glutamate	TAS [5-7]
	Energy source	chemoorganotroph
MIGS-6	Habitat	Soil, root nodule, host	TAS [5-7]
MIGS-15	Biotic relationship	Free living, Symbiotic	TAS [5-7]
MIGS-14	Pathogenicity	none	NAS [17]
	Biosafety level	1	TAS [21]
	Isolation	Root nodule	TAS [22]
MIGS-4	Geographic location	Livadi beach, Serifos,       Cyclades, Greece	TAS [22]
MIGS-5	Nodule collection date	April 1993	TAS [22]
MIGS-4.1 MIGS-4.2	Longitude      Latitude	24.518901       37.147034	TAS [22]
MIGS-4.3	Depth	not reported	NAS
MIGS-4.4	Altitude	2m	TAS [22]

Evidence codes - TAS: Traceable Author Statement (i.e., a direct report exists in the literature); NAS: Non-traceable Author Statement (i.e., not directly observed for the living, isolated sample, but based on a generally accepted property for the species, or anecdotal evidence). These evidence codes are from http://www.geneontology.org/GO.evidence.shtml of the Gene Ontology project [23]. If the evidence code is IDA, then the property was directly observed by one of the authors or an expert mentioned in the acknowledgements.