Title:Gold Complexes for Therapeutic Purposes: an Updated Patent Review (2010-2015)
Volume: 23
Issue: 29
Author(s): Chiara Nardon, Nicolò Pettenuzzo and Dolores Fregona
Affiliation:
Keywords:
Auranofin, Cancer, Cisplatin, Drugs, Gold complexes, Inflammation, Patents, Toxicology.
Abstract: Gold has always aroused great interest in the history of mankind. It has
been used for thousands of years for jewelry, religious cult valuables, durable
goods and in the art world. However, few know that such a precious and noble
metal was exploited in the past by the ancients also for its therapeutic properties.
More recently, in the twentieth century some complexes containing gold centers
in the oxidation state +1 were studied for the treatment of the rheumatoid arthritis
and the orally-administered drug Auranofin was approved by the FDA in 1985.
From the chemical point of view, gold derivatives deserve special attention due to
the unique position of this metal within the periodic table, which results in
unconventional relativistic effects and, ultimately, in the highest electronegativity,
electron affinity and redox potential among all metals.
In this review, after an introduction concerning the use of gold complexes in
medicine, we have examined all the patents internationally or nationally published
in the years 2010-2015 (until December 31, 2015) and describing new inorganic
compounds containing gold(I) and gold(III) with proved therapeutic properties.
These patents were filed to mainly protect compounds with promising anticancer
and anti-inflammatory activities (total 18 and 4, respectively). In particular, this
work explores both coordination compounds containing ligands with various
donor atoms (e.g., N-, O-, S- and -P) and organo-gold derivatives with at least one
Au-C bond. The toxicological profile and the intracellular targets reported for
some among the patented gold derivatives are discussed.
