Benzyl benzoates: New phlorizin analogs as mushroom tyrosinase inhibitors.

In our research, 14 benzyl benzoates with hydroxyl(s) (3-16) were synthesized and their inhibitory activity on mushroom tyrosinase was tested. Results indicated that among these compounds, 4-hydroxybenzyl 3,5-dihydroxybenzoate (3), 4-hydroxybenzyl 2,4-dihydroxybenzoate (5), 4-hydroxybenzyl 2,4,6-dihydroxybenzoate (7), 3-hydroxybenzyl 3,5-dihydroxybenzoate (8), 3-hydroxybenzyl 2,4-dihydroxybenzoate (10) exhibited inhibitory activity with their IC(50) less than 10μM. Further studies showed these five compounds were competitive inhibitors of tyrosinase and their structure-activity relationships were investigated in this article.