Benzimidazol-2-ylidene Silver Complexes: Synthesis, Characterization, Antimicrobial and Antibiofilm Activities, Molecular Docking and Theoretical Investigations

Five silver(I) complexes, namely chloro[1-methallyl-3-benzyl)benzimidazol-2-ylidene] silver (6), chloro[1-methallyl-3-(2,3,5,6-tetramethylbenzyl)benzimidazol-2-ylidene]silver (7), chloro[1-methallyl-3-(3,4,5-trimethoxylbenzyl)benzimidazol-2-ylidene]silver (8), chloro[1-methallyl- 3-(naphthylmethyl)benzimidazol-2-ylidene]silver (9), and chloro [1-methallyl-3-(anthracen-9-yl- methyl)benzimidazol-2-ylidene]silver (10), were prepared starting from their corresponding benzimidazolium salts and silver oxide in 71–81% yields. A single-crystal X-ray structure of 7 was determined. These five Ag-NHC complexes were evaluated for their antimicrobial and biofilm formation inhibition properties. Complex 10 exhibited high antimicrobial activities comparable to those obtained with standard drugs such as Fluconazole in contact with Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis, Escherichia coli, Acinetobacter baumannii, and Candida albicans. The latter complex has been shown to be very efficient in antibiofilm activity, with 92.9% biofilm inhibition at 1.9 μg/mL on Escherichia coli. Additionally, the molecules were optimized with DFT-based computational methods for obtaining insight into the structure/reactivity relations through the relative energies of the frontier orbitals. The optimized molecules were also analyzed by molecular docking method against DNA gyrase of Escherichia coli and CYP51 from Candida albicans.