Cellular toxicities of new titanocene dichloride derivatives containing pendant cyclic alkylammonium groups

Four new water soluble titanocene dichloride derivatives, all containing pendant alkyl- or arylammonium substituents and thus similar in functionality, to previously reported complexes which exhibit encouraging cytotoxic activities, have been synthesized. The cytotoxicities of the four compounds against the benchmark human cancer cell line A549 have been assessed, and a dicationic complex containing a 3-picolylium group is found to exhibit an IC50 value as low as any previously reported for this class of anti-cancer drug. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.