Design, Synthesis and Antitubercular Activity of Novel Isoniazid-Cyclic-Amine-Azachalcones Hybrids

In this work, it is described the design of twenty-four heterocyclic amine-azachalcones compounds through molecular hybridization of chalcone scaffold and fragments of isoniazid, fluoroquinolones, and linezolid with antituberculosis potential. The new compounds were synthesized via Claisen-Schmidt condensation, providing yields of 36-95%. Fifteen compounds showed antituberculosis activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv strain. Two amine-azachalcones 15 and 17 showed relevant biological activity with minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values of 6.62 and 4.85 mu M, respectively. Compound 12 showed the best profile of antitubercular activity with MIC = 9.54 mu M and selectivity index (SI) = 9.33. It was found that morpholine group is important to increase potency of antimycobacterial activity but also to add some toxicity to the chalcone molecular framework. The results described herein would be a guide in the designing of novel and optimized antitubercular derivatives based on the chalcone scaffold.