Sphingorhabdus arenilitoris sp. nov., isolated from a coastal sand, and reclassification of Sphingopyxis rigui as Sphingorhabdus rigui comb. nov. and Sphingopyxis wooponensis as Sphingorhabdus wooponensis comb. nov

A Gram-stain-negative, strictly aerobic, non-flagellated and rod-shaped bacterial strain, designated GJR-7^T, was isolated from coastal sand of the South Sea of South Korea. Strain GJR-7^T grew optimally at 30 °C, at pH 7.0-7.5 and without NaCl. Phylogenetic trees based on 16S rRNA gene sequences revealed that strain GJR-7^T clustered with the type strains of Sphingopyxis wooponensis, Sphingopyxis rigui and Sphingorhabdus planktonica, with which it exhibited 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity values of 96.0-96.3 %. Sequence similarities to the type strains of other recognized species were less than 95.5 %. Strain GJR-7^T contained Q-10 as the predominant ubiquinone and C_{18: 1}ω7c, 11-methyl C_{18: 1}ω7c and summed feature 3 (C_{16: 1}ω7c and/or C_{16: 1}ω6c) or C_{14: 0} 2-OH. The major polar lipids were sphingoglycolipid, phosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylglycerol, diphosphatidylglycerol and one unidentified glycolipid. The DNA G+C content of strain GJR-7^T was 55.5 mol%. Differential phenotypic properties, together with phylogenetic distinctiveness, revealed that strain GJR-7^T is separated from the type strains of Sphingopyxis wooponensis, Sphingopyxis rigui and Sphingorhabdus planktonica. On the basis of the data presented, strain GJR-7^Tis considered to represent a novel species of the genus Sphingorhabdus, for which the name Sphingorhabdus arenilitoris sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is GJR-7^T (= KCTC 42051^T = CECT 8531^T). It is also proposed that Sphingopyxis wooponensis and Sphingopyxis rigui should be reclassified as members of the genus Sphingorhabdus.