Cytotoxic hybrid molecules ‘metalloporphyrin–ellipticine’ having a high affinity for DNA

Abstract

Hybrid molecules ‘cationic metalloporphyrin–intercalators’ have been synthesized which have a high affinity for double-stranded DNA and are able to cleave it at low concentrations; compound (2), an efficient bleomycin model based on a cationic metalloporphyrin, is cytotoxic towards murine leukaemia cells L1210 in vitro; iron and zinc analogues of (2) are less active, despite having the same affinity for nucleic acids.