Zhuyongguania soli gen. nov., sp. nov., a difficult-to-culture isolate from paddy soil: proposal of Zhuyongguaniaceae fam. nov.

Members of the phylum Verrucomicrobiota are widespread but remain underrepresented in culture collections. In a cultivation survey of paddy soils in Fujian Province, China, two strains, sgz303538 T and sgz304111, were obtained on modified Reasoner’s 2A agar supplemented with nucleotides. The strains were conspecific (100% 16S rRNA gene sequence identity) and shared low similarity with validly published taxa, with Terrimicrobium sacchariphilum CGMCC 1.5168 T (family Terrimicrobiaceae , order Terrimicrobiales ) as the closest relative (88.5%). Phylogenetic analyses of the 16S rRNA gene and a 120-marker phylogenomic dataset consistently placed strain sgz303538 T as a deeply branching lineage within the order Terrimicrobiales , clearly separated from Terrimicrobiaceae . The genome of sgz303538 T is 7.83 Mb with a DNA G+C content of 57.5% and showed low genomic relatedness to T. sacchariphilum (ANI 71.2%; AAI 57.3%). On the basis of phylogenomics together with phenotypic and chemotaxonomic traits, strain sgz303538 T represents a novel family within the order Terrimicrobiales , for which the name Zhuyongguaniaceae fam. nov. is proposed. The genus and species proposed for Zhuyongguaniaceae are Zhuyongguania soli sp. nov. (type strain sgz303538 T =MCCC 1K09987 T =KCTC 102448 T ).