Methods for microbial classification are not always capable of distinguishing between isolates at the species level. We have previously characterised four Ferroplasma isolates that were >98.9% similar at the 16S rDNA level, the isolates showed marked phenotypic differences.. and one isolate was borderline on the 70% species boundary from DNA-DNA similarity data. In this study we have used statistical comparisons of two-dimensional polyacylamide gel electrophoresis gels for classification of closely related isolates. From the protein profile similarities an un-rooted tree was constructed that was congruent with a tree derived from DNA-DNA similarities.