On the medicinal chemistry of ferrocene

Organometallic chemistry and biochemistry have been merged in the last two decades into a new field: bioorganometallic chemistry. This new research area was devoted to the synthesis of new organometallic compounds and their biological and medical effects against some types of diseases, such as cancer and malaria. For several years, the use of ferrocene in bioorganometallic chemistry has been growing rapidly, and several promising applications have been developed since ferrocene is a stable, nontoxic compound and has good redox properties. This review will focus on ferrocenyl compounds which have been biologically evaluated against certain diseases. This area has attracted many researchers due to the promising results of some ferrocene compounds in the medicinal applications. Copyright (c) 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.