A yellow-pigmented bacterial strain, designated LL02(T), was isolated from hexachlorocyclohexane-contaminated soil from Spolana Neratovice, a former Czech producer of lindane. A neighbour-joining tree based on 16S rRNA gene sequences showed that strain LL02(T) occupied a distinct phylogenetic position in the genus Novosphingobium and showed the highest sequence similarity with Novosphingobium resinovorum NCIMB 8767(T) (98.59 %). DNA-DNA relatedness between strain LL02(T) and its closest phylogenetic neighbours was <70 %, which indicated that strain LL02(T) represented a novel species of the genus Novosphingobium. The DNA G+C content of strain LL02(T) was 67.72±0 mol%. The major respiratory quinone was ubiquinone Q-10. The polar lipid profile of the isolate corresponded to those reported for other members of the genus Novosphingobium (phosphatidylethanolamine, diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylmonomethylethanolamine and sphingoglycolipids), thus supporting its classification in the genus. Spermidine was the major polyamine. The major fatty acids were summed feature 3 (consisting of C(16 : 1)ω7c and/or C(16 : 1)ω6c; 40.13 %), summed feature 8 (consisting of C(18 : 1)ω7c and/or C(18 : 1)ω6c; 31.09 %) and C(14 : 0) 2-OH (23.16 %). The results obtained from DNA-DNA hybridization and biochemical and physiological tests clearly distinguished the isolate from its closest phylogenetic neighbours. Thus, strain LL02(T) represents a novel species of the genus Novosphingobium, for which the name Novosphingobium barchaimii sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is LL02(T) ( = CCM 7980(T) = DSM 25411(T)).