Discover the Maze-like Pathway for Glabridin Biosynthesis

Glabridin is a bioactive isoflavan predominantly produced in Glycyrrhiza species and is of significant pharmacological and industrial interest. However, its biosynthetic pathway remains incompletely resolved due to the involvement of multiple branching reactions and poorly characterized enzymatic steps. In this study, we employed untargeted and targeted LC–MS-based metabolomics to systematically characterize intermediates and pathway dynamics associated with glabridin biosynthesis. Metabolite profiling was performed across plant tissues from multiple Glycyrrhiza species to capture pathway-associated metabolite variation. The resulting dataset provides comprehensive mass spectrometric evidence supporting a maze-like biosynthetic route toward glabridin formation and offers a valuable resource for pathway elucidation and specialized metabolism research.