Recent advances in synthesis, metal complexes and biological evaluation of 2-aryl, 2-pyridyl and 2-pyrimidylbenzothiazoles as potential chemotherapeutics

Benzothiazole compounds are the most used heterocyclic compounds in medicinal chemistry, a common and complementary feature of many pharmaceuticals. Benzothiazole derivatives and their metal complexes offer a variety of pharmacological properties, and a high degree of structural diversity that has proven important for the search for new therapeutics. The broad pharmacologic activities of benzothiazole compounds revealed that these compounds are important for future drugs. Recently, research on benzothiazole-based medicinal chemistry has become a rapidly evolving and increasingly active subject. In particular, many benzothiazole-based compounds as clinical drugs have been widely used in practice to treat various types of diseases with high therapeutic efficacy. This review provides a recent summary of research in the last 20 years on the synthesis, metal complexes and biological evaluation of 2-aryl, 2-pyridyl and 2-pyrimidylbenzothiazoles as potential chemotherapeutics. This review is useful for researchers in this field to provide them with new ideas to design new benzothiazole-based drugs.