A highly atom economic, chemo-, regio- and stereoselective synthesis and evaluation of spiro-pyrrolothiazoles as antitubercular agents.

The 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition of azomethine ylides derived from substituted isatins and 1,3-thiazolane-4-carboxylic acid to a series of 1-methyl-3,5-bis[(E)-arylmethylidene]-tetrahydro-4(1H)-pyridinones afforded novel spiro-pyrrolothiazoles chemo-, regio- and stereoselectively in quantitative yields. These compounds were screened for their in vitro activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv (MTB) and multi-drug resistant M. tuberculosis (MDR-TB) using agar dilution method. Among the synthesized compounds, spiro[5.3'']-5''-nitrooxindole-spiro-[6.3']-1'-methyl-5'-(2,4-di-chlorophenylmethylidene)tetrahydro-4'(1H)-pyridinone-7-(2,4-dichlorophenyl)tetra-hydro-1H-pyrrolo[1,2-c][1,3]thiazole (9k) was found to be the most active with a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 0.6microM against MTB and MDR-TB. Copyright 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.