A Cytotoxic Ruthenium Tris(Bipyridyl) Complex that Accumulates at Plasma Membranes

Abstract

Shine a light: A ruthenium tris(bipyridyl) complex that was originally designed as a photosensitizer for solar cells has been found to adhere to plasma membranes.

Nitro/Nitrosyl-Ruthenium Complexes Are Potent and Selective Anti-Trypanosoma cruzi Agents Causing Autophagy and Necrotic Parasite Death

“…In fact, parasites treated with complex 3 exhibited a cell death pattern via necrosis rather than apoptosis. Our results are consistent with previous findings demonstrating that ruthenium bipyridyl complexes are prone to accumulate in the cell membrane (22). The presence of cytoplasmic vacuoles and myelin-like figures suggested that ruthenium complexes induce parasite autophagy.…”

“…In addition, this class of complexes exhibited inhibitory activity against the T. cruzi glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase, suggesting that ruthenium-nitrosyl complexes may have pleiotropic effects (19). From the point of view of medicinal chemistry, ruthenium complexes have been explored as an alternative to platinum complexes in the context of anticancer and anti-infective chemotherapy (20)(21)(22). More specifically, ruthenium complexes are described as outstanding bioactive agents because of the phosphine ligands, which provide great stability for these compounds (23)(24)(25)(26).…”

Lipophilic ruthenium complexes with tuned cell membrane affinity and photoactivated uptake

“…4 A, B, and C show the cellular uptake for each of the examined Ru(II) complexes after incubation at 37 °C for 24 h. Both D4 and D6 are no longer bound to the plasma membrane but are now found in punctuate structures in the cytoplasm whereas no luminescence is apparent in the nucleus. This pattern indicates uptake by endocytosis, however passive diffusion cannot be ruled out since that would also be expected to be more facile for the more lipophilic complexes [12,13,14]. From the…”

Mono and dinuclear half-sandwich platinum group metal complexes bearing pyrazolyl-pyrimidine ligands: Syntheses and structural studies

“…In many cases the charge transfer properties of these compounds justify this interest. Especially with these nitrogen donor ligands have been shown to be effective catalysts for oxidation reactions [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] and for ringopening metathesis polymerization [20] and recent studies of arene ruthenium complexes have shown that they are found to inhibit cancer cell growth [21][22][23][24][25][26], as non-linear optical (NLO) materials [27,28]. For a majority of the complexes studied, the metal centers are linked by a bridging ligand and the nature of the bridge has a fundamental influence on the electronic interaction between the metals and therefore on the characteristics of the material.…”