Abstract
A series of 1H-thieno[2,3-c]chromen-4(2H)-one derivatives were synthesised through Knoevenagel condensation of substituted flavanones with thiazolidine-2,4-dione in ethanol in the presence of piperidine. The mechanism of the reaction was proposed. All synthesised compounds were characterised by IR, 1H NMR, 13C NMR, HRMS, and elemental analysis. The structure of 2-(3-chlorophenyl)-1H-thieno[2,3-c]chromen-4(2H)-one was confirmed by a single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis. A preliminary antitumour screening showed that 2-(2-fluorophenyl)-1H-thieno [2,3-c]chromen-4(2H)-one had moderate to good activity against A549, BGC-823, HCT116 and MDA-MB-453 cancer cell lines, and 2-(3,4-dimethoxyphenyl)-1H-thieno[2,3-c]chromen-4(2H)-one displayed similar activity against these four kinds of cancer cells compared with the reference drug.