Synthesis, biological evaluation and docking studies of novel benzopyranone congeners for their expected activity as anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antipyretic agents.

8-Acetyl-7-hydroxy-4-phenyl-2H-benzopyran-2-one as starting material a number of 8-substituted derivatives (i.e., hydrazones 2a,b, imine 2c, chalcones 3, pyrazoles 4, 3-cyano-2-oxo-dihydropyridines 5, and/or 3-cyano-2-imino-dihydropyridines 6) were synthesized and assayed for their anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antipyretic activities. Compounds 3c, 4b and 4i showed significant anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antipyretic activities. In addition, 1, 3b, 4d, 4e, 5b, 6a, 6c, 6d, 6e showed anti-inflammatory activity, 2b, 4h, 5e exhibit analgesic activity, and 2b, 4h, 5e showed antipyretic effect. In addition, molecular modeling and docking of the tested compounds into cyclooxygenase II complexed with its bound inhibitor indomethacin (4COX) using molsoft icm 3.4-8C program was performed in order to predict the affinity and orientation of the synthesized compounds at the active site. Also, it was found that the active compounds 1, 4i, 6a-e interact with both Serine 530, and Tyrosine 385 amino acids which are the main amino acids involved in the mechanism of cyclooxygenase II inhibition. The synthesis of the pyrazole-containing new compounds 4 proved a successful hit; also, the 2-imino derivatives of 3-cyano-dihydropyridines were more successful than the 2-oxo derivatives. According to these results, we can conclude that compounds 1, 3c, 4b, 4i, and 6c appear to be the most interesting and seem potentially attractive as anti-inflammatory, analgesic, and antipyretic agents.