Controllable Soil Degradation Rate of 5-Substituted Sulfonylurea Herbicides as Novel AHAS Inhibitors

Molecular basis of two pyrimidine-sulfonylurea herbicides: from supramolecular arrangement to acetolactate synthase inhibition

CONTEXT

The design and synthesis of safe and highly active sulfonylurea herbicides is still a challenge. Therefore, following some principles of structure-activity relationship (SAR) of sulfonylurea herbicides, this work focuses on evaluating two sulfonylurea derivatives bearing electron-withdrawing substituents, namely, -(CO)OCH₃ and -NO₂ on the aryl group, on herbicidal activity. To understand the effects caused by the substituent groups, the molecular and electronic structures of the sulfonylureas were evaluated by density functional theory. Likewise, the crystalline supramolecular arrangements of both compounds were analyzed by Hirshfeld surface, QTAIM, and NBO, with the aim of verifying changes in intermolecular interactions caused by substituent groups. Finally, through a toxicophoric analysis, we were able to predict the interacting groups in their biological target, acetolactate synthase, and verify the interactions with the binding site.

METHODS

All theoretical calculations were conducted using the highly parameterized empirical exchange-correlation functional M06-2X accompanied by the diffuse and polarized basis set 6-311++G(d,p). The atomic coordinates were obtained directly from the crystalline structures, and from the energies of the frontier molecular orbitals (HOMO and LUMO), chemical descriptors were obtained that indicated the influence of the functional groups in the sulfonylureas on the reactivity of the molecules. The intermolecular interactions in the crystals were analyzed using the Hirshfeld, QTAIM, and NBO surfaces. Toxicophoric modeling was performed by the PharmaGist webserver and molecular docking calculations were performed by the GOLD 2022.1.0 software package so that the ligand was fitted to the binding site in a 10 Å sphere. For this, genetic algorithm parameters were used using the ChemPLP scoring function for docking and ASP for redocking.

Synthesis, herbicidal activity and soil degradation of novel 5-substituted sulfonylureas as AHAS inhibitors

BACKGROUND

Chlorsulfuron, metsulfuron-methyl and ethametsulfuron can damage sensitive crops in rotation pattern as a result of their long persistence in soil. To explore novel sulfonylurea (SU) herbicides with favorable soil degradation rates, four series of SUs were synthesized through a structure-based drug design (SBDD) strategy.

RESULTS

The target compounds, especially Ia, Id and Ie, exhibited prospective herbicidal activity against dicotyledon oil seed rape (Brassica campestris), amaranth (Amaranthus retroflexus), monocotyledon barnyard grass (Echinochloa crusgalli) and crab grass (Digitaria sanguinalis) at a concentration of 15 a.i. g ha^-1 . Additionally, Ia, Id and Ig displayed excellent inhibitory effects against AtAHAS, with Kapp i values of 59.1, 34.5 and 71.8 μm, respectively, which were much lower than that of chlorsulfuron at 149.4 μm. The π-π stack and H-bonds between the Ia conformation and AtAHAS in the molecular docking results confirmed the series of compounds to be conventional AHAS inhibitors. In alkaline soil (pH = 8.46), compounds Ia-Ig revealed various degrees of acceleration in the degradation rate compared with chlorsulfuron. Besides, compound Ia showed considerable wheat and corn safety under postemergence at the concentration of 30, 60 and even 120 a.i. g ha^-1 .

CONCLUSION

Overall, based on the synthetic procedure, herbicidal activity, soil degradation and crop safety, the Ia sulfonylureas series were chosen to be investigated as prospective AHAS inhibitors. The 5-dimethylamino group on SUs accelerated the degradation rate at different levels in alkaline soils which seems to be controllable in conventional cropping systems in their further application. © 2022 Society of Chemical Industry.

Chemical preparation, degradation analysis, computational docking and biological activities of novel sulfonylureas with 2,5-disubstituted groups

Based on the previous finding that a substitution at 5-position of the benzene ring is favorable to enhance the degradation rates of sulfonylurea herbicides, a total of 16 novel 2,5-disubsituted sulfonylurea compounds were chemically synthesized and fully characterized by means of ¹H NMR, ¹³C NMR, HRMS and X-ray diffraction. By using HPLC analysis, the degradation behavior of M03, a compound belonging to this family, was studied and confirmed that chlorsulfuron itself is not a degraded product of the 2,5-disubstituted sulfonylureas. Inhibition constants against plant acetohydroxyacid synthase (AHAS) were determined for selected compounds, among which SU3 showed seven times stronger activity against the mutant W574L enzyme than chlorsulfuron. Molecular docking suggested that the substituted group at 5-position of benzene ring is likely to interact with the surrounding residues Met200 and Asp376 of AtAHAS. From the greenhouse herbicidal assay and crop safety test, SU5 and SU6 are considered as herbicide candidates to control dicotyledon weeds in corn, while SU3 is likely to be a promising candidate to control dicotyledon weed species and barnyard grass in wheat. The present research has therefore provided some new insights to understand the structure-activity relationships of herbicidal sulfonylureas with di-substitutions at benzene ring.

Design, Synthesis, and Herbicidal Activity of Naphthalimide-Aroyl Hybrids as Potent Transketolase Inhibitors

Transketolase (TK) was identified as a new target for the development of novel herbicides. In this study, a series of naphthalimide-aroyl hybrids were designed and prepared based on TK as a new target and tested for their herbicidal activities. In vitro bioassay showed that compounds 4c and 4w exhibited stronger inhibitory effects against Digitaria sanguinalis (DS) and Amaranthus retroflexus (AR) with the inhibition over 90% at 200 mg/L and around 80% at 100 mg/L. Also, compounds 4c and 4w exhibited excellent postemergence herbicidal activity against DS and AR with the inhibition around 90% at 90 g [active ingredient (ai)]/ha and 80% at 50 g (ai)/ha in the greenhouse, which was comparable with the activity of mesotrione. The fluorescent quenching experiments of At TK revealed the occurrence of electron transfer from compound 4w to At TK and the formation of a strong exciplex between them. Molecular docking analyses further showed that compounds 4w exhibited profound affinity with At TK through the interaction with the amino acids in the active site, which results in its strong inhibitory activities against TK. These findings demonstrated that compound 4w is potentially a lead candidate for novel herbicides targeting TK.

Synthesis, Herbicidal Activity, Crop Safety and Soil Degradation of Pyrimidine- and Triazine-Substituted Chlorsulfuron Derivatives

Chlrosulfuron, a classical sulfonylurea herbicide that exhibits good safety for wheat but causes a certain degree of damage to subsequent corn in a wheat-corn rotation mode, has been suspended field application in China since 2014. Our previous study found that diethylamino-substituted chlorsulfuron derivatives accelerated the degradation rate in soil. In order to obtain sulfonylurea herbicides with good crop safety for both wheat and corn, while maintaining high herbicidal activities, a series of pyrimidine- and triazine-based diethylamino-substituted chlorsulfuron derivatives (W102-W111) were systematically evaluated. The structures of the synthesized compounds were confirmed with 1H NMR, 13C NMR, and HRMS. The preliminary biological assay results indicate that the 4,6-disubstituted pyrimidine and triazine derivatives could maintain high herbicidal activity. It was found that the synthesized compounds could accelerate degradation rates, both in acidic and alkaline soil. Especially, in alkaline soil, the degradation rate of the target compounds accelerated more than 22-fold compared to chlorsulfuron. Moreover, most chlorsulfuron analogs exhibited good crop safety for both wheat and corn at high dosages. This study provided a reference for the further design of new sulfonylurea herbicides with high herbicidal activity, fast degradation rates, and high crop safety.

Computer-Assisted Improvement of Sulfonylureas with Antifungal Properties and Limited Herbicidal Activity: Potential Application in Forage Conservation

This work reports studies at the molecular level of a series of modified sulfonylureas to determine the chemophoric sites responsible for their antifungal and herbicidal activities. For forage conservation, high antifungal potency and low phytotoxicity are required. A molecular modeling study based on multivariate image analysis applied to quantitative structure-activity relationship (MIA-QSAR) was performed to model these properties, as well as to guide the design of new agrochemical candidates. As a result, the MIA-QSAR models were reliable, robust, and predictive; for antifungal activity, the averages of the main validation parameters were r² = 0.936, q² = 0.741, and r²_pred = 0.720, and for herbicidal activity, the model was very predictive (r²_pred = 0.981 and r²_m = 0.944). From the interpretation of the MIA-plots, 46 novel sulfonylureas with likely improved performance were proposed, from which 9 presented promising calculated selectivity indexes. Docking studies were performed to validate the QSAR predictions and to understand the interaction mode of the proposed ligands with the acetohydroxyacid synthase enzyme.

Degradation of 5-Dialkylamino-Substituted Chlorsulfuron Derivatives in Alkaline Soil

Sulfonylurea herbicides are widely used as acetolactate synthase (ALS) inhibitors due to their super-efficient activity. However, some sulfonylurea herbicides show toxicity under crop rotation due to their long degradation time, for example, chlorsulfuron. Our research goal is to obtain chlorsulfuron-derived herbicides with controllable degradation time, good crop safety and high herbicidal activities. Based on our previously reported results in acidic soil, we studied the degradation behaviors of 5-dialkylamino-substituted chlorsulfuron derivatives (NL101–NL108) in alkaline soil (pH 8.39). The experimental data indicate that addition of the 5-dialkylamino groups on the benzene ring of chlorsulfuron greatly accelerated degradation in alkaline soil. These chlorsulfuron derivatives degrade 10.8 to 51.8 times faster than chlorsulfuron and exhibit excellent crop safety on wheat and corn (through pre-emergence treatment). With a comprehensive consideration of structures, bioassay activities, soil degradation and crop safety, it could be concluded that 5-dialkylamino-substituted chlorsulfuron derivatives are potential green sulfonylurea herbicides for pre-emergence treatment on both wheat and corn. The study also provides valuable information for the discovery of new sulfonylurea herbicides for crop rotation.

Design, Synthesis, and Herbicidal Activity of Thioether Containing 1,2,4-Triazole Schiff Bases as Transketolase Inhibitors

Transketolase (TK) represents a potential target for novel herbicide development. To discover novel TK inhibitors with potency against resistant weeds, 36 thioether compounds containing 1,2,4-triazole Schiff bases were designed and synthesized for herbicidal activity evaluation. The results demonstrated that compounds 5av and 5aw provided excellent weed control with inhibition of over 90% against the tested weeds, even at concentrations as low as 100 mg/L in vitro. In addition, compounds 5av and 5aw exhibited higher postemergence herbicidal activity than all of the positive controls against the tested weeds at 50-90 g [active ingredient (ai)]/ha in a greenhouse, while being safe for crops of maize and wheat at 90 g (ai)/ha. Fluorescent binding experiments of At TK indicated that compounds 5av and 5aw had strong TK inhibitory activity and could tightly bind with the enzyme At TK. Also, molecular docking analyses revealed that the structures of compounds 5av and 5aw were suitable for TK inhibitory activity. Taken together, these results suggested that compounds 5av and 5aw were promising herbicide candidates for weed control in wheat and maize fields targeting TK.

The chemical mechanisms of the enzymes in the branched-chain amino acids biosynthetic pathway and their applications

l-Valine, l-isoleucine, and l-leucine are three key proteinogenic amino acids, and they are also the essential amino acids required for mammalian growth, possessing important and to some extent, special physiological and biological functions. Because of the branched structures in their carbon chains, they are also named as branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs). This review will highlight the advance in studies of the enzymes involved in the biosynthetic pathway of BCAAs, concentrating on their chemical mechanisms and applications in screening herbicides and antibacterial agents. The uses of some of these enzymes in lab scale organic synthesis are also discussed.