Ketol-acid reductoisomerase (KARI, EC 1.1.1.86), also known as acetohydroxy acid isomeroreductase, is one of the key enzymes invovled in the biosynthesis of the branched-chain amino acids that exsit in higher plants and microorganisms but not in animals, and can be used as target for designing herbicides and fungicides. To look for novel pesticidal structures based on the KARI target, hundreds of compounds with low binding energy toward KARI have been obtained through the database using the molecular docking method. These potential structures provide more information for the design of new KARI herbicidal molecules, among which a lot of piperazine ring-containing compounds were found to have low binding energy. It is known that piperazine derivatives possess versatile physicological and biological activities, while their researches on pesticide chemistry area are relatively little. Referring some other hit structure together from the database-searching results, several series of new piperazine derivatives such as piperazine-containing triazole Mannich base, N-substituted phenylsulfonyl-4-substituted piperazine-1-carboxamide, etc. were synthesized and the biological activities were tested. Among which, several novel compounds were found to have significant fungicidal activities, and several to have favorable herbicidal and KARI inhibitory activities.

Synthesis and biological activities of new piperazine derivatives based on the ketol-acid reductoisomerase target

248th National Meeting (2014)

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