Synthesis and biological evaluation of substituted benzohydrazide Schiff base adduct as potential cholinesterase inhibitors

A total of Twenty two (22) derivatives of benzohydrazide bearing Schiff base have been synthesized, characterized through 1HNMR, 13C NMR and screened against cholinesterase inhibitory potentials. All the adducts (1–22) showed varying degree of cholinesterase inhibitory potential IC50 ranging between 13.23 ± 0.02 to 59.09 ± 1.22 µM against acetylcholinesterase, with IC50 values ranging from 23.55 ± 0.32 to 61.55 ± 0.58 µM against butyrylcholinesterase. Among the series analogs 1, 3, 8, 12, 14, 15, 17, 18 and 22 with IC50 values 20.05 ± 0.13, 17.32 ± 0.15, 14.32 ± 0.97, 23.33 ± 0.56, 18.02 ± 0.09, 19.05 ± 0.13, 15.11 ± 0.23, 13.23 ± 0.02, and 22.57 ± 0.09 µM respectively showed excellent inhibitory potential against acetylcholinesterase and with IC50 values 31.46 ± 0.98, 26.06 ± 0.08, 25.33 ± 1.49, 30.12 ± 0.78, 28.11 ± 0.5, 29.33 ± 0.19, 25.37 ± 0.47, 23.55 ± 0.32 and 33.12 ± 0.78 against butylcholinesterase as compared to the standard Galanthamine. All other analogs showed moderate inhibitory potential. A structure-activity relationship has been established for all compounds. Through molecular docking studies, the interactions between compounds with the enzyme active sites were confirmed.