A bacterial strain named IGB-41T was isolated from a soil sample from an ant hill near Stuttgart, Germany. The strain was Gram-negative, rod-shaped, motile and facultatively anaerobic. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA grouped the strain IGB-41T within the class
Betaproteobacteria
into the family
Neisseriaceae
together with
Silvimonas amylolytica
NBRC 103189T,
Silvimonas iriomotensis
NBRC 103188T and
Silvimonas terrae
KM-45T as the closest relatives with sequence similarities of 96.7, 96.6 and 96.1 %, respectively. The G+C content of the genomic DNA was determined to be 61.5 mol% and quinone analysis revealed Q-8 as the only detectable quinone. Major cellular fatty acids were identified as C16 : 0, summed feature 3 (iso-C15 : 0 2-OH and/or C16 : 1ω7c) and C18 : 1ω7c . Strain IGB-41T was unique in harbouring phosphoaminolipids, aminolipids and glycoaminolipids when compared with
Silvimonas amylolytica
NBRC 103189T in polar lipid analysis. On the basis of the physiological, phenotypic and genotypic characteristics of strain IGB-41T, we suggest that the novel strain should be assigned to a new genus Amantichitinum and novel species Amantichitinum ursilacus. The type species of the genus Amantichitinum is Amantichitinum ursilacus and the type strain is IGB-41T ( = DSM 23761T = CIP 110167T).