Expanded Structure-Activity Studies of Lipoxazolidinone Antibiotics

The lipoxazolidinone family of marine natural products, which contains an unusual 4-oxazolidinone core, was found to possess potent antimicrobial activity against methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). Herein, we expanded our previous synthetic efforts by preparing selected aryl derivatives of the lipoxazolidinones and further evaluating the potential to expand the activity of this class of molecules to Gram-negative pathogens. With these analogs, we explored the effect of varying the substitution pattern around the aromatic ring, increasing the chain length between the oxazolidinone core and the aryl system, and how altering the position of more polar functional groups affected the antimicrobial activity. Finally, we utilized a TolC knockout strain of E. coli to demonstrate that our compounds are subject to efflux in Gram-negative pathogens, and activity is restored in these knockouts. Together these results provide additional data for the further development of 4-oxazolidinone analogs 5, 20, and 21 for the treatment of infectious disease.