Gold phosphine and carbene complexes as potential antimitochondrial anticancer agents: design, synthesis and biological chemistry.

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To overcome the two major problems associated with existing anticancer drugs (resistance to therapy and lack of discrimination between normal and cancer cells) there is much current interest in targeting mitochondrial cell death pathways in chemotherapy. This project will probe the mode of action of a series of gold complexes containing pyridylphosphines that may act by an antimitochondrial mechanism. Also, we will evaluate a new family of gold complexes based on carbene rather than phosphine components. Such compounds offer the potential advantages of ease of synthesis, lower toxicity and the ability to fine-tune molecular properties to maximise anticancer activity.