Binucleating Hydrazonic Ligands and Their μ-Hydroxodicopper(II) Complexes as Promising Structural Motifs for Enhanced Antitumor Activity.

Very few inorganic antineoplastic drugs have entered the clinic in the last decades, mainly because of toxicity issues. Because copper is an essential trace element of ubiquitous occurrence, decreased side effects could be expected in comparison with the widely used platinum anticancer compounds. In the present work, two novel hydrazonic binucleating ligands and their μ-hydroxo dicopper(II) complexes were prepared and fully characterized. They differ by the nature of the aromatic group present in their aroylhydrazone moieties: while HL1 and its complex, 1, possess a thiophene ring, HL2 and 2 contain the more polar furan heterocycle. X-ray diffraction indicates that both coordination compounds are very similar in structural terms and generate dimeric arrangements in the solid state. Positive-ion electrospray ionization mass spectrometry analyses confirmed that the main species present in a 10% dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO)/water solution should be [Cu(HL)(OH)] and the DMSO-substituted derivative [Cu(L)(DMSO)]. Scattering techniques [dynamic light scattering (DLS) and small-angle X-ray scattering] suggest that the complexes and their free ligands interact with bovine serum albumin (BSA) in a reversible manner. The binding constants to BSA were determined for the complexes through fluorescence spectroscopy. Moreover, to gain insight into the mechanism of action of the compounds, calf thymus DNA binding studies by UV-visible and DLS measurements using plasmid pBR322 DNA were also performed. For the complexes, DLS data seem to point to the occurrence of DNA cleavage to Form III (linear). Both ligands and their dicopper(II) complexes display potent antiproliferative activity in a panel of four cancer cell lines, occasionally even in the submicromolar range, with the complexes being more potent than the free ligands. Our data on cellular models correlate quite well with the DNA interaction experiments. The results presented herein show that aroylhydrazone-derived binucleating ligands, as well as their dinuclear μ-hydroxodicopper(II) complexes, may represent a promising structural starting point for the development of a new generation of highly active potential antitumor agents.