Synthesis, characterization and evaluation of antioxidant activities of some novel chalcones analogues.

Background: Chalcone, an important intermediate of flavonoid synthetic pathway, has been shown to exhibit diverse biological and pharmacological activities such as anti- cancer, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, etc.

Results: In this study, a novel series of chalcones fatty acid esters 5b-e and 6b-e have been synthesized via the reaction of the respective chalcones with either palmitic or stearic acid. Another related class of compounds comprising 2,3-disubstituted chalcones 7b-d and 8b(b')-d as well as 2-amino-6-(substituted-phenyl)-4-substitutedphenyl-nicotinonitrile derivatives 9a,c,e have been also prepared by both electrophilic and Michael addition reactions, respectively, with the corresponding chalcones.