Melaminivora alkalimesophila gen. nov., sp. nov., a melamine-degrading betaproteobacterium isolated from a melamine-producing factory A taxonomic study was carried out on strain CY1 T , which is a novel bacterium isolated from wastewater sludge of a melamine-producing factory in Sanming city, Fujian, China. Strain CY1 T was shown to rapidly and completely degrade melamine to NH 3 and CO 2 under aerobic conditions. The isolate was Gram-stain-negative, short-rod-shaped and motile by one unipolar flagellum. Growth was observed at salinities from 0 to 7 % NaCl (optimum, 0.1 %), at temperatures from 15 to 50 6C (optimum, 40-45 6C) and at pH 7-9.5 (optimum pH 9.5). Quinone-8 was detected as the major respiratory quinone. 16S rRNA gene sequence comparisons showed that strain CY1 T was affiliated to the family Comamonadaceae in the class Betaproteobacteria. It was most closely related to members of the genera Alicycliphilus (95.5 %), Diaphorobacter (94.6-95.1 %), Acidovorax (92.9-95.4 %), Delftia (93.0-93.6 %) and Comamonas (92.6-93.9 %). The average nucleotide identity (ANI) values between strain CY1 T and those representing related genera ranged from 84.0 to 86.1 % using Mummer, and from 74.9 to 81.1 % using BLAST. The dominant fatty acids were C 16 : 1 v7c and/or C 16 : 1 v6c, C 16 : 0 , C 10 : 0 3-OH and C 18 : 1 v7c and/or C 18 : 1 v6c, and the major polar lipids consisted of phosphatidylethanolamine, diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylglycerol, one unidentified phospholipid and one unidentified aminophospholipid. The G+C content of the chromosomal DNA was 69.5 mol%. On the basis of the phenotypic and phylogenetic data, strain CY1 T represents a novel species of a new genus, for which the name Melaminivora alkalimesophila gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain of Melaminivora alkalimesophila is CY1 T (5CCTCC AB 2012024 T 5DSM 26006 T ).