Strigolactone mimic 2-nitrodebranone is highly active in Arabidopsis growth and development.

Strigolactones play crucial roles in regulating plant architecture and development, as endogenous hormones, and orchestrating symbiotic interactions with fungi and parasitic plants, as components of root exudates. rac-GR24 is currently the most widely used strigolactone analog and serves as a reference compound in investigating the action of strigolactones. In this study, we evaluated a suite of debranones and found that 2-nitrodebranone (2NOD) exhibited higher biological activity than rac-GR24 in various aspects of plant growth and development in Arabidopsis, including hypocotyl elongation inhibition, root hair promotion and senescence acceleration. The enhanced activity of 2NOD in promoting AtD14-SMXL7 and AtD14-MAX2 interactions indicates that the molecular structure of 2NOD is a better match for the ligand perception site pocket of D14. Moreover, 2NOD showed lower activity than rac-GR24 in promoting Orobanche cumana seed germination, suggesting its higher ability to control plant architecture than parasitic interactions. In combination with the improved stability of 2NOD, these results demonstrate that 2NOD is a strigolactone analog that can specifically mimic the activity of strigolactones and that 2NOD exhibits strong potential as a tool for studying the strigolactone signaling pathway in plants.