Biological activity antimicrobial agents

Most drugs in the pyrimidine series fall into four categories the barbiturates, the sulfonamides, the antimicrobials and the antitumour agents. In addition there are innumerable pyrimidines with diverse biological activities, some of which are in use. 

In this review, we use the terms, biologically active or bioactive for any substance which elicits some biological response in another organism. Early investigations on bioactive marine isonitriles focussed on compounds that might serve as chemical defense agents (cf. Sect. 5.1). As chemists began to resolve mixtures into individual components, other tests related to antiviral, antimicrobial, or antiparasitic activity, were reported. Often, bioassays were performed... 

The sesquiterpene quinones and hydroquinones display a wide range of biological activities.4 Some of the compounds are cytu-toxic, whereas others show antimicrobial characteristics. Avarol (2) has been the subject of investigation as a consequence of its ability to inhibit reverse transcriptase, but no clinical value (as an anti-AIDS agent, for example) has yet been established.3... 

Among biologically active compounds - derivatives of isatin - there is methisazone (1-methylisatin 3-thiosemicarbazone), which has been used as a prophylactic agent against the smallpox virus [139-141], Methods for the synthesis of compounds with the general formula 146 have been developed in the search for new antiviral and antimicrobial agents [142] ... 

In recent years multicomponent reactions have been extensively utilized to produce libraries of heterocyclic molecules with biological activity against a variety of targets. The majority of these compounds were tested for their anticancer, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties and numerous promising compounds were identified and were further evaluated. With the continuous development of new multicomponent reactions and combinations of MCRs with subsequent transformations, this area of research holds great promise for the discovery of novel therapeutic agents. 

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