Hybridization of the effective pharmacophores for treatment of epilepsy: design, synthesis, in vivo anticonvulsant activity, and in silico studies of phenoxyphenyl-1,3,4-oxadiazole-thio-N-phenylacetamid hybrids

BACKGROUND: Epilepsy is a common neurological disorder. The available drugs for this disease only control convulsions in nearly 70% of patients, while bearing many side effects. In this study, a new series of phenoxyphenyl-1,3,4-oxadiazole-thio-N-phenylacetamid hybrids 8a-m was designed, synthesized, and evaluated as potent anticonvulsant agents. METHODS: Phenoxyphenyl-1,3,4-oxadiazole-thio-N-phenylacetamid derivatives 8a-m were synthesized with well-known chemical reactions and anticonvulsant activity of them was determined by pentylenetetrazole (PTZ) and maximal electroshock (MES) induced seizures in mice. Phenoxyphenyl-1,3,4-oxadiazole-thio-N-phenylacetamid scaffold has the necessary pharmacophores to be a benzodiazepine (BZD) receptor agonist, thus, the most potent anticonvulsant compounds were assayed in vivo and in silico as BZD receptor agonist. Furthermore, in vivo neurotoxicity evaluation and in silico physicochemical, pharmacokinetic, and toxicity study on the most potent compounds were also performed. RESULTS: Obtained results demonstrated that two compounds among the title new compounds have anticonvulsant activity in PTZ test while all of the new compounds are active in the MES test. The best anticonvulsant activities were obtained with nitro derivatives 8k and 8L. In vivo evaluation of flumazenil effect (a BZD receptor antagonist) on anticonvulsant activity of compound 8k confirmed that this compound is a BZD receptor agonist. The most potent compounds 8k and 8L interacted with the important residues of BZD-binding site of GABA(A) receptor. Furthermore, neurotoxicity of the latter compounds was lower than positive control diazepam. CONCLUSION: According to these results, our designed scaffold can be a valuable lead structure for further structural developments and assessments to obtain a new potent anticonvulsant agent. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13065-023-01000-6.