Design, antimicrobial testing, and molecular docking studies of new chalcone and pyrimidine derivatives based on 2-phenyl-1H-pyrazol-3(2H)-one

Heterocyclic pyrimidine and pyrazole rings have attracted the interest of medicinal chemists because of their pharmacological potential including antimicrobial activity. Based on molecular hybridization, new chalcones 6a-g and pyrimidines 7a-g based on a pyrazole scaffold were designed. The synthesis of these compounds involved mild condensation reactions between compound 4 and various aromatic aldehydes in a mixture of ethanol/NaOH (95:5 v/v) to give the corresponding chalcones 6a-g. These chalcones were further reacted with urea in the presence of a base in ethanol to produce the pyrimidine derivatives 7a-g. These new candidates were screened for their in vitro antimicrobial activities and molecular docking studies were evaluated. The antibacterial and antifungal studies of all synthesized compounds against the strains tested showed that compounds 6c, d, and 7c, d exhibited the highest antibacterial and antifungal activities. In addition, the structure-activity relationship and docking studies are discussed. The synthesized compounds 6c, 6d, 7c, and 7d showed the highest antibacterial and antifungal activities against the tested strains.