Ce/SiO2 composite as an efficient catalyst for the multicomponent one-pot synthesis of substituted pyrazolones in aqueous media and their antimicrobial activities

•Multicomponent reactions provide a convenient platform to construct complex polycyclic structural scaffolds.•Ce–SiO2 composite as a selective and reusable solid catalyst for the synthesis of polysubstituted pyrazolones.•Eco-compatibility and aqueous medium protocols are added advantages of the reaction.•New Pyrazolone derivatives exhibit good to promising antimicrobial activity.

We describe here the preparation and characterization of a Ce/SiO2 catalyst and its application in an eco-friendly and convenient synthesis of pyrazolone derivatives via one-pot multicomponent reaction of 2-naphthol, aldehydes, phenylhydrazine and ethyl acetoacetate under aqueous media. The catalyst was prepared using sol-gel method and characterized by XRD, XPS, UV-DRS, SEM, TEM and surface area analysis. 2D NMR technique was utilized to ascertain the pyrazolone tautomer. The new compounds were evaluated for anti-microbial activity and exhibited good to promising activity against most of the tested bacterial and fungal strains.

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