Title:Metallopharmaceuticals in Therapy - A New Horizon for Scientific Research
Volume: 25
Issue: 15
Author(s): Agnieszka Chylewska*, Malgorzata Biedulska, Przemyslaw Sumczynski and Mariusz Makowski*
Affiliation:
- Laboratory of Intermolecular Interactions, Faculty of Chemistry, University of Gdansk, Wita Stwosza 63, 80- 308 Gdansk,Poland
- Laboratory of Intermolecular Interactions, Faculty of Chemistry, University of Gdansk, Wita Stwosza 63, 80- 308 Gdansk,Poland
Keywords:
Metallopharmaceuticals, coordination compounds, cancer therapeutic drugs, antimicrobial agents,
medical diagnosis, mechanisms of activities.
Abstract: Coordination chemistry offers much scope for the design of novel and therapeutic
agents, including metallopharmaceuticals. The widespread use of metal complexes
as effective pharmaceuticals, e.g. cancer therapeutic, anti-inflammatory, antidiabetic
drugs or antimicrobial and diagnostic agents, demonstrates that the cytotoxicity of metal
ions can be finely controlled via the appropriate choice of ligands. The successful targeting
of radioisotopes again depends on the ligand design and metal oxidation state. The
complexes of platinum, ruthenium, cobalt, copper and other d-block metal ions have been
used in medicine for a long time but only recent advances have been made in understanding
the molecular basis of mechanism of their action. Due to the above mentioned purpose,
we decided to prepare a detailed description of target-based research, directed towards
a design and application possibilities, with the known mechanisms of action of
metal ion complexes in the broad sense of therapy definition. The review also covers the
progress, limitations and challenges of the above-mentioned approaches and emphasizes
the advantages of well known and new metallopharmaceuticals in medicine and pharmacy.
