Cashew nutshell liquid catalyzed green chemistry approach for synthesis of a Schiff base and its divalent metal complexes: molecular docking and DNA reactivity.

Cashew Nut Shell Liquid (CNSL) anacardic acid was used, for the first time, as a green and natural effective catalyst for the synthesis of a quinoline based amino acid Schiff base ligand from the condensation of 2-hydroxyquinoline-3-carbaldehyde with l-tryptophan via solvent-free simple physical grinding technique. The use of the nontoxic CNSL natural catalyst has many benefits over toxic reagents and the desired product was obtained in high yield in a short reaction time. The procedure employed is simple and does not involve column chromatography. Moreover, a series of metal(II) complexes (metal = iron(II), cobalt(II), nickel(II), and copper(II)) supported by the synthesized new quinoline based amino acid Schiff base ligand (L) has been designed and the compositions of the metal(II) complexes were examined by various analytical techniques. The findings imply that the 2-hydroxyquinoline-3-carbaldehyde amino acid Schiff base (L) serves as a dibasic tridentate ONO ligand and synchronizes with the metal(II) in octahedral geometry in accordance with the general formula [M(LH)]. Molecular docking study of the metal(II) complexes with B-DNA dodecamer has revealed good binding energy. The conductivity parameters in DMSO suggest the existence of nonelectrolyte species. The interaction of these metal complexes with CT-DNA has shown strong binding via an intercalative mode with a different pattern of DNA binding, while UV-visible photo-induced molecular cleavage analysis against plasmid DNA using agarose gel electrophoresis has revealed that the metal complexes exhibit photo induced nuclease activity.