Synthesis of Some New Dihydropyrimidines by Iodine as a Catalyst at Ambient Temperature and Evaluation of Their Biological Activity

An improved method for the synthesis of some new dihydropyrimidines from aromatic aldehydes, 1,3-dicarbonyl compounds, and thiourea with significant enhancement in reaction rates, short reaction time (4–6 h), good to excellent yields (70–93%), and ambient temperature using molecular iodine as catalyst is described. The biological evaluation revealed that the newly synthesized compounds and exhibited good antimicrobial activity and moderate antimycobacterial activity against Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37RV.