Substituted 1,3-dioxoisoindoline-4-aminoquinolines coupled via amide linkers: Synthesis, antiplasmodial and cytotoxic evaluation.

Synthesis of C-5-substituted 1,3-dioxoisoindoline-4-aminoquinolines having amide group as a spacer was developed with an intent to evaluate their antiplasmodial activities. The synthesized dioxoisoindoline-aminoquinolines tethered with β-alanine as a spacer and secondary amine as substituent displayed good anti-plasmodial activities. Compound 7j, with an optimum combination of β-alanine and an ethyl chain length as linker along with diethylamine as the secondary amine counterpart at dioxoisoindoline proved to be most potent and non-cytotoxic with IC50 of 0.097 µM against W2 strain of P. falciparum and a selective index of >2000.