Description of Altererythrobacter aerius sp. nov., isolated from air, and emended description of the genus Altererythrobacter.

A Gram-stain-negative, yellow-pigmented, ovoid to rod-shaped, strictly aerobic bacterial strain, designated 100921-2T, was isolated from air at the foot of Xiangshan Mountain. Phylogenetic and phenotypic analysis of the organism revealed that the isolate belongs to the genus Altererythrobacter. Strain 100921-2T showed high 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity (96.01-94.70 %) to other type strains of the genus Altererythrobacter, with the highest similarity to Altererythrobactermarensis MSW-14T. Growth of strain 100921-2T was observed at 4-50 °C (optimum, 30 °C), at pH 4.5-10.0 (optimum, pH 7.0) and at salinities of 0-10 % (w/v) NaCl (optimum 0-0.5 %). The major fatty acids were C18 : 1ω7c (27.8 %), C17 : 1ω6c (23.1 %), 11-methyl C18 : 1ω7c(11.9 %), summed feature 3 (9.1 %) and C15 : 0 2-OH (7.9 %). The predominant respiratory quinone was ubiquinone-10 (Q-10). Polar lipid analysis indicated the presence of diphosphatidylglycerol, sphingoglycolipid, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylcholine, two unknown phospholipids, five unknown polar lipids and two unknown glycolipids. The DNA G+C content of the type strain was 67.5 mol%. On the basis of the data from the polyphasic characterization, strain 100921-2T represents a novel species, for which the name Altererythrobacter aerius sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is 100921-2T (=CFCC 14287T=KCTC 42844T).