Abstract:
Cancer is a major health problem and important efforts are devoted to find out novel and effective treatments. Despite the progresses achieved in targeted- and immune-therapies, reality shows that in a clinical setting at least one potent cytotoxic compound is required in the therapeutic regimen. Metal-based chemotherapeutics (e.g. cisplatin, carboplatin and oxaliplatin) have shown high clinical relevance becoming first-line treatment for several cancer types. However, the non-physiological nature of the metal often leads to undesired side-effects. This situation has awaked a quest for the development of transition biometal-based therapeutics.
In this project we are developing cytotoxic redox-active Cu complexes and deciphering their location and mechanisms of action inside cells to improve their therapeutic efficiency.