One-compound-two-pharmacophores: design, synthesis and antimalarial activities of chloroquinoline-cassiarin

Abstract

This paper describes the design and synthesis of a potential antimalarial compound, chloroquinoline-cassiarin (6) using 4,7-dichloroquinoline and the natural product barakol (1) extracted from the leaves of Cassia siamea as starting materials. In this paper a one compound-two-pharmacophores concept is introduced in which coupling of two known pharmacophores into one has been described. The concept is not only useful to organic synthesis but also to drug development researches. The synthesized compound 6 exhibited potent in vitro antimalarial activity at IC₅₀ = 0.51 µM, and low toxicity where at 20 µM, 80% viability of HeLa cells was observed.