Designed Synthesis of Diversely Substituted Hydantoins and Hydantoin-Based Hybrid Molecules: A Personal Account

Hydantoin and its analogs such as thiohydantoin and iminohydantoin have received substantial attention both from a chemical and biological point of view. Several compounds of this class have shown useful pharmacological activities such as anticonvulsant, antitumor, antiarrhythmic, herbicidal, and others that lead in some cases to clinical applications. Because of broad-spectrum activities, intensive research efforts have been dedicated in industry and academia to the synthesis and structural modifications of hydantoin and its derivatives. Realizing the importance of hydantoin in organic and medicinal chemistry, we also initiated a research program to successfully design and develop the new routes/methods resulting in the formation of hydantoin, thiohydantoin, and iminohydantoin substituted at different positions particularly at the N-1 position without following protection-deprotection strategy. Given the fact that the combination of two or more pharmacophoric groups may lead to hybrid molecules which result in a mixed mechanism of action on the biological target. We, therefore, further extended the developed strategy for the synthesis of new types of hydantoin-based hybrid molecules by combining hydantoin with a triazole, isoxazoline, and phosphate scaffolds as another pharmacophoric group to exploit diverse biological functions.