A polyphasic taxonomic approach was applied to strains of the species Staphylococcus
vitulinus and Staphylococcus pulvereri in order to clarify their taxonomic relatedness. Four
reference strains, representing both species, and seven strains isolated from human clinical
material were characterized by biotyping, ribotyping and SDS-PAGE analysis of whole-cell
proteins, and none of the screening approaches allowed the two taxa to be distinguished.
DNA–DNA hybridization experiments between four selected representative strains, including the
type strains, confirmed that Staphylococcus pulvereri is a later synonym of Staphylococcus
vitulinus.