Oceanirhabdus sediminicola gen. nov., sp. nov., an anaerobic bacterium isolated from sea sediment College of Life Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, PR China A novel anaerobic bacterium, designated NH-JN4T was isolated from a sediment sample collected in the South China Sea. Cells were Gram-stain-positive, spore-forming, peritrichous and rod-shaped (0.5-1.2¾2.2-7 mm). The temperature and pH ranges for growth were 22-42 6C and pH 6.0-8.5. Optimal growth occurred at 34-38 6C and pH 6.5-7.0. The NaCl concentration range for growth was 0.5-6 % (w/v) with an optimum of 2.5 %. Catalase and oxidase were not produced. Substrates which could be utilized were peptone, tryptone, yeast extract, beef extract and glycine. Main fermentation products from PYG medium were formate, acetate, butyrate and ethanol. Strain NH-JN4 T could utilize sodium sulfite as an electron acceptor.No respiratory quinone was detected. The predominant fatty acids were anteiso-C 15 : 0 , C 16 : 0 , iso-C 15 : 0 , anteiso-C 17 : 0 and C 16 : 0 DMA. (Jung et al., 2010) and the species were divided into 19 cluster groups according to their 16S rRNA gene sequences by Collins et al. (1994). Some species of this genus were isolated from sediments (Jung et al., 2010;Kim et al., 2006Kim et al., , 2007Lee et al., 2007). Here, we describe an obligatory anaerobic, spore-forming and Gram-stainpositive strain, which represents a novel species of a new genus belonging to the family Clostridiaceae.Strain NH-JN4 T was isolated with CJW medium from a sediment sample of the South China Sea (118 u 679 E 21u 959 N), collected by the Second Institute of Oceanography, State Oceanic Administration of China in 2010. CJW medium contained (l 21 distilled water) 1.0 g Na 2 SO 4 , 30.0 g NaCl, 5.0 g MgCl 2 . 6H 2 O, 0.7 g KCl, 1.0 g CaCl 2 . 2H 2 O, 0.5 g NH 4 Cl, 0.4 g K 2 HPO 4 , 0.4 g KH 2 PO 4 , 2.0 g NaHCO 3 , 2.0 mg Fe(NH 4 ) 2 (SO 4 ) 2 , 3.0 g yeast extract (Difco), 4.0 g tryptone (Difco), 0.6 g Lcysteine, 0.001 g resazurin, pH 6.8. To make PYG medium 10.0 g glucose, 7.0 g yeast extract, 1.0 g tryptone and 5.0 g peptone were added to CJW medium. To make solid medium, 1.5 % agar was added. Sediment was dispersed and suspended in sterile CJW medium. The clear liquid of the upper layer was inoculated onto plates anaerobically and cultivated at 37 u C in the anaerobic chamber (Bugbox; Ruskinn) until colonies appeared. The Hungate roll-tube technique (Hungate, 1969;Bryant, 1972) was used to Abbreviation: FAME, fatty acid methyl ester.