Reaction of 2‐[(2‐aminoethyl)amino]ethanol with pyridine‐2‐carbaldehyde and complexation of the products with CuII and CdII along with docking studies

The reaction between 2‐[2‐(aminoethyl)amino]ethanol and pyridine‐2‐carbaldehyde in a 1:2 molar ratio affords a mixture containing 2‐({2‐[(pyridin‐2‐ylmethylidene)amino]ethyl}amino)ethanol (PMAE) and 2‐[2‐(pyridin‐2‐yl)oxazolidin‐3‐yl]‐N‐(pyridin‐2‐ylmethylidene)ethanamine (POPME). Treatment of this mixture with copper(II) chloride or cadmium(II) chloride gave trichlorido[(2‐hydroxyethyl)({2‐[(pyridin‐2‐ylmethylidene)amino]ethyl})azanium]copper(II) monohydrate, [Cu(C₁₀H₁₆N₃O)Cl₃]·H₂O or [Cu(HPMAE)Cl₃]·H₂O, 1 , and dichlorido{2‐[2‐(pyridin‐2‐yl)oxazolidin‐3‐yl]‐N‐(pyridin‐2‐ylmethylidene)ethanamine}cadmium(II), [CdCl₂(C₁₆H₁₈N₄O)] or [CdCl₂(POPME)], 2 , which were characterized by elemental analysis, FT–IR, Raman and ¹H NMR spectroscopy and single‐crystal X‐ray diffraction. PMAE is potentially a tetradentate N₃O‐donor ligand but coordinates to copper here as an N₂ donor. In the structure of 1 , the geometry around the Cu atom is distorted square pyramidal. In 2 , the Cd atom has a distorted octahedral geometry. In addition to the hydrogen bonds, there are π–π stacking interactions between the pyridine rings in the crystal packing of 1 and 2 . The ability of PMAE, POPME and 1 to interact with ten selected biomolecules (BRAF kinase, CatB, DNA gyrase, HDAC7, rHA, RNR, TrxR, TS, Top II and B‐DNA) was investigated by docking studies and compared with doxorubicin.