Design, synthesis, molecular docking, in silico ADMET profile and anticancer evaluations of sulfonamide endowed with hydrazone-coupled derivatives as VEGFR-2 inhibitors.

A new series of sulfonamide endowed with hydrazone coupled to dimethyl and/or diethyl malonates were prepared. Various sulfa drugs were diazotized and followed by coupling with active methylene of dimethyl and/or diethyl malonate to afford the new intermediates hydrazones 3 and 4. The reactivity of hydrazone derivatives towards hydrazines was investigated. Thus, a novel series of 3,5-dioxopyrazolidine7were obtained by treatment with hydrazine hydrate. When hydrazones were allowed to react with phenyl hydrazine, the alkyl 2-((4-(N-(substituted)sulfamoyl)phenyl)diazenyl)-3-oxo-3-(2-phenylhydrazinyl)propanoateswere obtained 8 and/or 10. Their anticancer activities were evaluated against HepG2, HCT-116 and MCF-7. HepG2 was the most sensitive one. In particular, compounds 7, 7 and 10 were found to be the most potent derivatives with IC = 6.43 ± 0.5, 9.66 ± 0.8, 10.57 ± 0.9 µM, 8.65 ± 0.7, 7.49 ± 0.6, 14.29 ± 1.3 µM and 8.97 ± 0.7, 10.13 ± 0.9, 13.82 ± 1.1 µM respectively. Sorafenib and doxorubicin were used as reference drugs. The most potent derivatives 7, 7, 7, 8 and 10 were tested for their cytotoxicity against normal VERO cell lines. Compounds 7, 7, 7, 8 and 10 are respectively, 2.41, 4.85, 4.08, 3.23 and 5.89 fold times more toxic in HCT116 than in VERO normal cells. Moreover, the most active anti-proliferative derivatives 7, 7, 7, 8 and 10 were subjected to further biological study to evaluate their inhibitory potentials against VEGFR-2. The tested compounds displayed high to good inhibitory activity with IC values ranging from 0.14 ± 0.02 to 0.23 ± 0.03 µM. Among them, compounds 7, 7 and 10 were found to be the most potent derivative that inhibited VEGFR-2 at IC values of 0.14 ± 0.02, 0.15 ± 0.02 and 0.15 ± 0.02 µM respectively. sorafenib was used as reference drug. Furthermore, ADMET profile was evaluated for the four most active compounds in comparison to doxorubicin as a reference drug. The data obtained from docking studies were highly correlated with that obtained from the biological screening.