The Recent Development of Piperazine and Piperidine Derivatives as Antipsychotic Agents

Schizophrenia is a chronic neuropsychiatric disorder that affects nearly 1% of the global population. There are various anti-psychotic drugs available for the treatment of schizophrenia, but they have certain side effects; therefore, there is a need to explore and develop novel potential lead compounds against schizophrenia. The currently available drugs e.g. typical and atypical antipsychotics act on different dopamine and serotonin receptors and as per literature reports, various piperidine and piperazine derivatives have shown promising activity against these receptors. When different heterocyclic groups are attached to basic piperidine and piperazine rings, the antipsychotic activity is greatly potentiated. In this direction, various antipsychotic drugs have been synthesized at the laboratory level, and few are under clinical trial studies, such as Lu AE58054, PF-04802540, ORG25935, DMXB-A, Bitopertin, and ABT-126. In the present review, we include the studies related to the effect of different substituents on piperidine/piperazine derivatives and their anti-psychotic activity. Various series of synthesized compounds by other researchers with piperidine/piperazine nucleus have been reviewed and diagrammatically represented in the form of SAR (structure-activity relationships), which will help the scientists for the development of potential lead compounds.