Validated Method for Strigolactone Quantification by Ultra High-Performance Liquid Chromatography – Electrospray Ionisation Tandem Mass Spectrometry Using Novel Deuterium Labelled Standards

Introduction: Strigolactones (SLs) are important plant hormones. They are difficult to analyse because they occur in very small concentrations especially in comparison with other plant hormones and other substances can interfere with their detection. Objective: To develop a procedure for the extraction, purification and quantification of SLs from plant roots. Methodology: Samples were prepared by extraction of plant root tissues with ethyl acetate. Then the extracts were further purified with silica column chromatography. The natural SLs in the final extracts were quantified using novel deuterium labelled SLs. The results of the methodology were compared with those of the procedure of Yoneyama and coworkers. Results: This procedure required about 1-g root samples to detect and quantify simultaneously the SLs (orobanchyl acetate and fabacyl acetate) concentration with high reliability. Conclusion: A method was developed for determining endogenous fabacyl acetate and orobanchyl acetate in plant tissue based on novel deuterium labelled standards. A method of orobanchol quantification using a synthetic SL GR24 as internal standard was proposed.