A bacterial strain, designated D13T, was isolated from sandy soil near a stream in Sinan-gun, Republic of Korea. Cells were Gram-stain-negative, aerobic, non-motile and flexible rod-shaped. Growth occurred at 15-35 °C (optimum 30 °C) and pH 6.5-8.0 (pH 7.0). NaCl was not obligatory for growth but could be tolerated at up to 0.5 % (w/v) NaCl. The DNA G+C content of the genomic DNA of strain D13T was 57.7 mol% and a phylogenetic analysis of the 16S rRNA gene sequence revealed that strain D13T formed a distinct evolutionary lineage within the family Rhodanobacteraceae of the order Lysobacterales. Strain D13T showed highest 16S rRNA sequence similarity to Lysobacter hankyongensis KTCe-2T (92.7 %), followed by Luteimonas cucumeris Y4T (92.7 %), Dyella japonica XD53T (92.6 %) and Aquimonas voraii GPTSA 20T (92.5 %). The major cellular fatty acids (>10 % of the total) were iso-C16 : 0, iso-C15 : 0 and summed feature 9 (iso-C17 : 1ω9с and/or C16 : 0 10-methyl). The respiratory quinone was ubiquinone-8 and the major polar lipids of the isolate consisted of phosphatidylethanolamine, diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylmonomethylethanolamine. Based on polyphasic analysis, strain D13T could be differentiated from other genera in the family Rhodanobacteraceae, which suggests that strain D13T represents a novel species of a new genus in the family Rhodanobacteraceae, for which the name Ahniella affigens gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is D13T (=KACC 19270T=JCM 31634T).
Keywords: Ahniella; Ahniella affigens; Gammaproteobacterium; sandy soil; whole-genome sequencing.