A library of 32 organoruthenium compounds has been synthesised. Known and novel C-N cyclometalated compounds as well as N-C-N and N-N-C pincer derivatives of this metal have been used in this purpose. Most of the compounds have been tested for their in vitro antitumoral behaviours, good to excellent activities have thus been found. Several of the newly synthesized compounds pass the symbolic barrier of the nanomolar range for their IC(50) indicating a critical improvement. The level of activity is tentatively correlated to physicochemical properties of the compounds such as their Ru(III/II) redox potential and their lipophilicity (log P).

Gold phosphine complexes, such as auranofin, have been recognized for decades as antirheumatic agents. Clinical trials are now underway to validate their use in anticancer or anti-HIV treatments. However, their mechanisms of action remain unclear. A challenging question is whether the gold phosphine complex is a prodrug that is administered in an inactive precursor form or rather that the gold atom remains attached to the phosphine ligand during treatment. In this study, we present two novel gold complexes, which we compared to auranofin and to their phosphonium analogue. The chosen ligand is a phosphine-based smart probe, whose strong fluorescence depends on the presence of the gold atom. The in vitro biological action of the gold complexes and the phosphonium derivative were investigated, and a preliminary in vivo study in healthy zebrafish larvae allowed us to evaluate gold complex biodistribution and toxicity. The different analyses carried out showed that these gold complexes were stable and behaved differently from phosphonium and auranofin, both in vitro and in vivo. Two-photon microscopy experiments demonstrated that the cellular targets of these gold complexes are not the same as those of the phosphonium analogue. Moreover, despite similar IC50 values in some cancer cell lines, gold complexes displayed a low toxicity in vivo, in contrast to the phosphonium salt. They are therefore suitable for future in vivo investigations.

Overexpression of hypoxia-inducible factor-1 (HIF-1) is a common feature in solid malignancies related to oxygen deficiency. Since increased HIF-1 expression correlates with advanced disease stage, increased angiogenesis and poor prognosis, HIF-1 and its signaling pathway have become targets for cancer chemotherapy. In this study, we identified noscapine to be a novel small molecule inhibitor of the HIF-1 pathway based on its structure-function relationships with HIF-1 pathway inhibitors belonging to the benzylisoquinoline class of plant metabolites and/or to microtubule binding agents. We demonstrate that noscapine treatment of human glioma U87MG and T98G cell lines exposed to the hypoxic mimetic agent, CoCl 2 , inhibits hypoxia-mediated HIF-1· expression and transcriptional activity as measured by decreased secretion of VEGF, a HIF-1 target gene. Inhibition of hypoxia-mediated HIF-1· expression was due, in part, to its ability to inhibit accumulation of HIF-1· in the nucleus and target it for degradation via the proteasome. One mechanism of action of microtubule binding agents is their antiangiogenic activity associated with disruption of endothelial tubule formation. We show that noscapine has similar properties in vitro. Thus, noscapine may possess novel antiangiogenic activity associated with two broad mechanisms of action: first, by decreasing HIF-1· expression in hypoxic tumor cells, upregulation of target genes, such as VEGF, would be decreased concomitant with its associated angiogenic activity; second, by inhibiting endothelial cells from forming blood vessels in response to VEGF stimulation, it may limit the process of neo-vascularization, correlating with antitumor activity in vivo. For more than 75 years, noscapine has traditionally been used as an oral cough suppressant with no known toxic side effects in man. Thus, the studies reported here have found a novel function for an old drug. Given its low toxicity profile, its demonstrated antitumor activity in several animal models of cancer and its potential to inhibit the HIF-1 pathway, noscapine should be considered as an antiangiogenic chemotherapy for glioma.

Ruthenium complexes are considered as potential replacements for platinum compounds in oncotherapy. Their clinical development is handicapped by a lack of consensus on their mode of action. In this study, we identify three histones (H3.1, H2A, H2B) as possible targets for an anticancer redox organoruthenium compound (RDC11). Using purified histones, we confirmed an interaction between the ruthenium complex and histones that impacted on histone complex formation. A comparative study of the ruthenium complex versus cisplatin showed differential epigenetic modifications on histone H3 that correlated with differential expression of histone deacetylase (HDAC) genes. We then characterized the impact of these epigenetic modifications on signaling pathways employing a transcriptomic approach. Clustering analyses showed gene expression signatures specific for cisplatin (42%) and for the ruthenium complex (30%). Signaling pathway analyses pointed to specificities distinguishing the ruthenium complex from cisplatin. For instance, cisplatin triggered preferentially p53 and folate biosynthesis while the ruthenium complex induced endoplasmic reticulum stress and trans-sulfuration pathways. To further understand the role of HDACs in these regulations, we used suberanilohydroxamic acid (SAHA) and showed that it synergized with cisplatin cytotoxicity while antagonizing the ruthenium complex activity. This study provides critical information for the characterization of signaling pathways differentiating both compounds, in particular, by the identification of a non-DNA direct target for an organoruthenium complex.

International audienceTen metal-based complexes and associated ligands have been synthesized and characterized. One of the metal ligands is a coumarin-phosphine derivative, which displays tunable fluorescence properties. The fluorescence is quenched in the case of the free ligand and ruthenium and osmium complexes, whereas it is strong for the gold complexes and phosphonium derivatives. These trends were rationalized by theoretical calculations, which revealed non-radiative channels involving a dark state for the free ligands that is lower in energy than the emissive state and is responsible for the quenching of fluorescence. For the Ru-II and Os-II complexes, other non-radiative channels involving the manifold of singlet and triplet excited states may play a role. The anti-proliferative properties of all the compounds were evaluated in cancer cell lines (SW480, HCT116, MDA-MB-231 and MCF-7); higher IC50 values were obtained for gold(I) complexes, with the free ligands being only weakly cytotoxic

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[Ru(N∧N)(MeCN)2(2-Ph-2′-Py)]PF6 (2-Ph-2′-Py = ortho-metalated 2-phenylpyridine, N∧N = phenanthroline, 2,2′-bipyridine), in which one of the nitrogens of the N∧N ligand is bound to Ru trans to the phenyl unit of 2-PhPy, were slowly isomerized (2 days) in refluxing 1,1-dichloroethane/MeCN (9/1) or more rapidly (although with a reduced yield) in the presence of UV light, to afford compounds in which the same N atom was bound to Ru trans to the pyridine of 2-PhPy; these new compounds, in opposition to their well-known isomers, proved to be nicely reactive toward substitution reactions of the MeCN ligands, by other bidentate N-containing ligands such as 4,4′-R2-2,2′-bipyridine (R = H, OMe, COOH) and 4,7-dimethyl-1,10-phenanthroline. These results question the exact structure of the already reported heteroleptic tris(chelate) RuII complexes obtained from the same starting material in which the incoming bidentate ligands were incorrectly believed to be bound to the Ru atom at positions trans to N atoms.

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