A light-orange-coloured, facultatively anaerobic, rod-shaped bacterium (strain SW28 T ), which was isolated from seawater in Korea, was taxonomically studied by a polyphasic approach. This organism formed round terminal endospores in swollen sporangia. The peptidoglycan type is A4α, based on L-Lys-L-Ala-D-Asp. The predominant menaquinone is MK-7 and the major fatty acid is ante-C 15 :0 . The GMC content of the DNA is 40 mol %. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rDNA sequences showed that strain SW28 T falls within the radiation of a cluster comprising the rRNA group 2 bacilli and non-Bacillus-type organisms. Strain SW28T showed the highest degree of relatedness to the type strain of Sporosarcina ureae, sharing 968 % 16S rDNA similarity. Levels of DNA-DNA relatedness between strain SW28 T and S. ureae DSM 2281 T and the type strains of some Bacillus species forming a coherent phylogenetic cluster are less than 125 %. On the basis of phenotypic and chemotaxonomic characteristics, 16S rDNA sequence analysis and DNA-DNA relatedness data, it is proposed that strain SW28T should be placed in the genus Sporosarcina as a new species, Sporosarcina aquimarina sp. nov. The type strain is SW28 T (l KCCM 41039 T l JCM 10887 T ). From the results of the taxonomic re-evaluation, it is also proposed that Bacillus globisporus, Bacillus psychrophilus and Bacillus pasteurii be transferred to the genus Sporosarcina as Sporosarcina globispora, Sporosarcina psychrophila and Sporosarcina pasteurii, respectively.

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