Novel Quinoline-based Ir(III) Complexes Exhibit High Antitumor Activity and .

Eight novel Ir(III) complexes listed as [Ir(H-P)(P)]PF (), [Ir(H-P)(dMP)]PF (), [Ir(H-P)(MP)]PF (), [Ir(H-P)(tMP)]PF (r), [Ir(MPy)(P)]PF (), [Ir(MPy)(dMP)]PF (), [Ir(MPy)(MP)]PF (), [Ir(MPy)((tMP)]PF () with 2-phenylpyri-dine () and 3-methyl-2-phenylpyridine () as ancillary ligands and pyrido-[3,2-]-pyrido[1',2':1,2]imidazo[4,5-]phenazine (), 12,13-dimethyl pyrido-[3,2-]-pyrido[1',2':1,2]-imidazo-[4,5-]-phenazine (), 2-methylpyrido [3,2-]-pyrido-[1',2':1,2]-imidazo-[4,5-]-phenazine (), and 2,12,13-trimethylpyrido-[3,2-]-pyrido-[1',2':1,2]-imidazo-[4,5-]-phenazine () as main ligands, respectively, were designed and synthesized to fully characterize and explore the effect of their toxicity on cancer cells. Cytotoxic mechanism studies demonstrated that the eight Ir(III) complexes exhibited highly potent antitumor activity selectively against cancer cell lines NCI-H460, T-24, and HeLa, and no activity against HL-7702, a noncancerous cell line. Among the eight Ir(III) complexes, exhibited the highest cytotoxicity with an IC = 5.