Heterometallic Multinuclear Complexes as Anti‐Cancer Agents‐An Overview of Recent Developments

Abstract

This review provides a critical assessment of the advances made in the development of heterometallic multinuclear complexes as potential chemotherapeutic agents, with the aim of providing a starting point for future investigators. The combination of the classical transition metals (Pt, Ru and Au) with other metal moieties has the potential to result in complexes with improved pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic properties. This enables selective targeting of the biological targets, which offers a possible way of circumventing the issue of drug‐resistance. This review catalogues the reported heterometallic multinuclear complexes and comments on possible synergism, stability, structure activity relationships and mechanistic studies. It was found that there remains a large scope for future research, especially concerning the combination of Pt IV and Cu I metals with other metals centres.