The research of innovative antimicrobial agents represents a cutting edge topic. Hence, we synthesized and characterised novel salicylanilide N-monosubstituted carbamates.
Twenty compounds were evaluated in vitro against eight bacterial strains and eight fungal species. The lowest minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) were found to be <= 0.49 M.
Genus Staphylococcus, including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, and fungus Trichophyton mentagrophytes showed uniformly the highest rate of susceptibility, whilst Gram-negative bacteria and most of the fungi were less susceptible. A wide range of carbamates provided comparable or superior in vitro antimicrobial activity in comparison to established drugs.
Interestingly, extended-spectrum p-lactamase producing strain of Klebsiella pneumoniae was inhibited with MICs starting from 31.25 M. With respect to Staphylococci, 2-[(4-bromophenyl) carbamoyl]-4-chlorophenyl phenylcarbamate exhibited the lowest MIC values (<= 0.98 mu M). 2-[(4-Bromophenyl)carbamoyl]-4-chlorophenyl benzylcarbamate showed the widest spectrum of anti fungal action.
The results indicate that some salicylanilide carbamates can be considered to be promising candidates for future investigation.