Synthesis, X-ray crystal structure and antimycobacterial activity of enantiomerically pure 1-ethyl-2,3-dicyano-5-(het)aryl-6-hetaryl-1,6-dihydropyrazines

The Petasis reaction of 6-alkoxy adducts of 1-alkyl-2,3-dicyano-5- arylpyrazinium salts with aromatic boronic acids, such as 2-thienylboronic, 2-furanylboronic and 3-thienylboronic acids, or their benzo analogs in dichloromethane proceeds smoothly at room temperature with the formation of the corresponding 5-aryl-6-hetaryl substituted 1,6-dihydropyrazine derivatives. All dihydropyrazines were separated as pure enantiomers by chiral HPLC, and their absolute configurations for each pair of enantiomers have been determined by X-ray analysis. Individual enantiomers were screened in vitro for their antimycobacterial activities against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37Rv, avium, terrae and extensively drug-resistant and multi-drug-resistant strains isolated from tuberculosis patients in Ural region (Russia). It has been shown that several compounds exhibit a good level of antituberculosis activity compared to the reference drugs.