1 Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Science, Kasetsart University, 50 Paholyothin Road, Bangkok 10900, Thailand 2 The International Center for Biotechnology, Osaka University, 2-1 Yamada-oka, Suita-City, Osaka 565-0871, Japan 3 NITE Biological Resource Center (NBRC), Department of Biotechnology, National Institute of Technology and Evaluation, 2-5-8 Kazusakamatari, Kisarazu-City, Chiba 292-0818, Japan Correspondence Savitree Limtong fscistl{at}ku.ac.th Two yeast strains (TM2-16 and PT1-17 T ) were isolated by membrane filtration from samples of estuarine water collected from two mangrove forests, in Khao Lumpee-Haad Thaimueang National Park and Mu Ko Ra-Ko Prathong National Park, Phang-Nga Province, Thailand. Analysis of the D1/D2 domain of the large-subunit rDNA sequences revealed that the sequences of the two strains were identical. The closest species in terms of pairwise sequence similarity was Candida galli , but the level of nucleotide substitutions (13.2 %) was sufficient to justify the description of a separate species. Phylogenetic analysis demonstrated that the two strains occupy a basal position with respect to Yarrowia lipolytica and C . galli of the Yarrowia clade, supported by a high bootstrap value. The two strains showed identical phenotypic characteristics, including proliferation by multilateral budding, absence of ascospores and ballistoconidia and negative Diazonium blue B and urease reactions. The major ubiquinone was Q-9. On the basis of the above findings, these two strains were assigned to a single novel species of the genus Candida , for which the name Candida phangngensis sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is PT1-17 T (=BCC 21231 T =NBRC 101967 T =CBS 10407 T ). Abbreviations: LSU, large subunit; SSU, small subunit The GenBank/EMBL/DDBJ accession numbers for the sequences of the D1/D2 domain of the LSU rDNA of strains TM2-16 and PT1-17 T are AB304771 and AB304772 .