A novel Gram-stain-negative, strictly aerobic, rod-shaped and agar-hydrolysing bacterium, designated D2T, was isolated from a marine sediment sample collected from the coast of Weihai, China (37° 31' 59″ N 122° 03' 47″ E). The cells were motile by a lateral flagellum. Growth was observed at 10-42 °C, at pH 6.0-9.0 and with 0.5-8 % (w/v) NaCl. Phylogenetic analysis based on the 16S rRNA gene sequence showed that strain D2T belonged to the genus Catenovulum, appearing closely related to Catenovulum agarivorans YM01T (96.3 % 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity) and Catenovulum maritimumQ1T (93.9 %). The dominant fatty acids were summed feature 3 (C16 : 1ω7c and/or iso-C15 : 0 2-OH), C16 : 0 and C10 : 0 3-OH. The polar lipids were phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylglycerol, two phosphoaminolipids, two unknown lipids and three phospholipids. Ubiquinone 8 (Q-8) was found to be the major respiratory quinone. The DNA G+C content was 40.4 mol%. On the basis of genotypic, phenotypic and phylogenetic evidence, strain D2T is presented as a representative of a novel species of the genus Catenovulum, for which the name Catenovulum sediminis sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is D2T (=KCTC 42869T=MCCC 1H00129T). An emended description of the genus Catenovulum is also provided.
Keywords: Catenovulum sediminis sp. nov.; agar-hydrolysing; coastal sediment; polyphasic taxonomy.