Allobranchiibius huperziae gen. nov., sp. nov., a member of Dermacoccaceae isolated from the root of a medicinal plant Huperzia serrata (Thunb.).

A Gram-stain-positive, non-spore-forming actinobacterial strain, designated CPCC 204077, was isolated from the surface-sterilized root of a medicinal plant Huperzia serrata (Thunb.) collected from Sichuan Province, south-west China. The peptidoglycan type of strain CPCC 204077 was detected as A4α with an l-Lys-l-Ser-d-Asp interpeptide bridge. Galactose, glucose, rhamnose and ribose were the sugar compositions in the whole-cell hydrolysates. MK-8(H4) was the only menaquinone. The polar lipid profile consisted of diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylinositol, one unidentified phospholipid and one unidentified glycolipid. The major fatty acid was iso-C16 : 0. The genomic DNA G+C content was 71.0 mol%. The phylogenetic tree based on 16S rRNA gene sequences showed that strain CPCC 204077 stood for a distinct lineage within the family Dermacoccaceaealongside the genera Branchiibius, Demetria and Barrientosiimonas, with the highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarities to Branchiibius hedensis Mer 29717 (95.0 %), Calidifontibacter indicus PC IW02 (95.0 %), Barrientosiimonas humi 39 (94.9 %) and Demetria terragena HKI 0089 (94.7 %), and less than 94.7 % sequence similarities to all other species. Signature nucleotides in the 16S rRNA sequence showed that the strain contained the Dermacoccaceaefamily-specific 16S rRNA signature nucleotides and a genus-specific diagnostic nucleotide signature pattern. Combining the genotypic and phenotypic analyses, we propose that strain CPCC 204077 represents a novel species of a new genus in the family Dermacoccaceae with the name Allobranchiibius huperziae gen. nov., sp. nov. Strain CPCC 204077 (=NBRC 110719=DSM 29531) is the type strain of the type species.