Eilatimonas milleporae gen. nov., sp. nov., a marine bacterium isolated from the hydrocoral Millepora dichotoma Nithyanand Paramasivam, 1 Eitan Ben-Dov, 2,3 Luba Arotsker 1 and Ariel Kushmaro 1,3,4 Correspondence Ariel Kushmaro arielkus@bgu.ac.il 1 Avram and Stella Goldstein-Goren Department of Biotechnology Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, PO Box 653, Be’er-Sheva 84105, Israel 2 Achva Academic College, M.P. Shikmim 79800, Israel 3 National Institute for Biotechnology in the Negev, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, PO Box 653, Be’er-Sheva 84105, Israel 4 School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 637819, Singapore A marine bacterial strain, designated MD2 T , was isolated from the damaged tissue of a hydrocoral, Millepora dichotoma, collected from the coral reef in the northern Red Sea, Gulf of Eilat, Israel. Strain MD2 T was Gram-reaction-negative, rod-shaped and motile, and formed small, creamy and opaque colonies, 1–2 mm in diameter, after 3 days incubation on Marine agar at 306C. The novel strain grew well in nutrient broth at 1.5–6 % NaCl and at 20–376C. The major cellular fatty acids were iso-C 17 : 1 v9c, iso-C 17 : 0 ,C 18 : 1 v7c and C 17 : 1 v6c. The polar lipids consisted of phosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine, an unidentified lipid, two unidentified phospholipids, two unidentified glycolipids and two unidentified aminolipids. Ubiquinone Q-10 was the only respiratory lipoquinone. The DNA G+C content was 60.3 mol%. Analysis of the 16S rRNA gene sequence placed the organism in the a-subclass of the Proteobacteria with a sequence divergence of about 9 % from any species with a validly published name. The highest 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity (approximately 91 %) was notably with type strains of members of the genus Kordiimonas, Kordiimonas aestuarii 101-1 T , Kordiimonas lacus S3-22 T and Kordiimonas gwangyangensis GW14-5 T . On the basis of genotypic, chemotaxonomic and phenotypic distinctness, strain MD2 T represents a novel species in a new genus of the class Alphaproteobacteria, for which the name Eilatimonas milleporae gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain of the type species is MD2 T (5LMG 26586 T 5DSM 25217 T ). The class Alphaproteobacteria belongs to the phylum Proteobacteria and forms one of the largest groups within the domain Bacteria that include numerous phototrophs, chemolithotrophs, chemo-organotrophs and aerobic photo- heterotrophs (Kersters et al., 2006; Garrity & Holt, 2001). Recently, several new genera and orders have been reported in the Alphaproteobacteria (Cho & Giovannoni, 2003). They are abundant constituents of various terrestrial and marine environments (Giovannoni et al., 2005), and more than half of these new genera were isolated from marine environ- ments (Kwon et al., 2005). As a justification to the above- mentioned statement, several recently reported novel orders within the Alphaproteobacteria, i.e. Sneathiellales (Jordan et al., 2007), Kiloniellales (Wiese et al., 2009) and Magnetococcales (Bazylinski et al., 2013), were all isolated from the marine environment. The intimate association that many Alpha- proteobacteria exhibit with eukaryotic organisms is intri- guing because of their agricultural, medical and symbiotic importance (Fredricks, 2006; Skorpil & Broughton, 2006). Coral diseases and disease-like syndromes affecting the corals are the primary cause of deterioration of coral reefs in the Gulf of Eilat (Red Sea), followed by pollution and anthropogenic interference (Rosenberg & Loya, 2004; Ben- Haim et al., 1999; Rasoulouniriana et al., 2009). Recently, Zvuloni et al. (2011) discovered the occurrence of unusual multifocal lesions, presumably bleaching or feeding scar patterns, on Millepora dichotoma populations, which are an important contributor to the formation of the calcareous base for reef growth along the Gulf of Eilat. In an attempt to identify the microbial community associated with the The GenBank accession number for the 16S rRNA gene sequence of strain MD2 T is HQ288781. International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology (2013), 63, 1880–1884 DOI 10.1099/ijs.0.043976-0 1880 043976 G 2013 IUMS Printed in Great Britain