Design, synthesis, in vitro, and in silico evaluations of benzo[d]imidazole-amide-1,2,3-triazole-N-arylacetamide hybrids as new antidiabetic agents targeting α-glucosidase

α-Glucosidase as a carbohydrate-hydrolase enzyme is a crucial therapeutic target for type 2 diabetes. In this work, benzo[d]imidazole-amide containing 1,2,3-triazole-N-arylacetamide derivatives 8a–n were synthesized and evaluated for their inhibitory activity against α-glucosidase. In vitro α-glucosidase inhibition assay demonstrated that more than half of the title compounds with IC50 values in the range of 49.0–668.5 μM were more potent than standard inhibitor acarbose (IC50 = 750.0 µM). The most promising inhibitor was N-2-methylphenylacetamid derivative 8c. Kinetic study revealed that compound 8c (Ki = 40.0 µM) is a competitive inhibitor against α-glucosidase. Significantly, molecular docking and molecular dynamics studies on the most potent compound showed that this compound with a proper binding energy interacted with important amino acids of the α-glucosidase active site. Study on cytotoxicity of the most potent compounds 8c, 8e, and 8g demonstrated that these compounds did not show cytotoxic activity against the cancer and normal cell lines MCF-7 and HDF, respectively. Furthermore, the ADMET study predicted that compound 8c is likely to be orally active and non-cytotoxic.