The role of bridging and terminal ligand electronic and
steric
properties on the structure and antiproliferative activity of two-coordinated
gold(I) complexes was investigated on seven novel binuclear and trinuclear
gold(I) complexes synthesized by the reaction of either Au2(dppm)Cl2, Au2(dppe)Cl2, or Au2(dppf)Cl2 with potassium diisopropyldithiophosphate,
K[(S-O
i
Pr)2], potassium dicyclohexyldithiophosphate,
K[(S-OCy)2], or sodium bis(methimazolyl)borate, Na(S-Mt)2, which afforded air-stable gold(I) complexes. In 1–7, the gold(I) centers adopt a two-coordinated
linear geometry and are structurally similar. However, their structural
features and antiproliferative properties highly depend upon subtle
ligand substituent changes. All complexes were validated by 1H, 13C{1H}, 31P NMR, and IR spectroscopy.
The solid-state structures of 1, 2, 3, 6, and 7 were confirmed using
single-crystal X-ray diffraction. A density functional theory geometry
optimization calculation was used to extract further structural and
electronic information. To investigate the possible cytotoxicities
of 2, 3, and 7, in vitro cellular
tests were carried out on the human cancerous breast cell line MCF-7. 2 and 7 show promising cytotoxicity.