Ruthenium polypyridyl complexes may act as light-activatable anticancer prodrugs provided
that they are protected by well-coordinated ligands that i) prevent coordination of other
biomolecules to the metal center in the dark and ii) can be removed by visible light
irradiation. In this paper, the use of monodentate thiol ligands RSH as light-cleavable
protecting groups for the ruthenium complex [Ru (tpy)(bpy)(OH 2)](PF 6) 2 ([1](PF 6) 2; tpy=
2, 2′; 6′, 2 ″-terpyridine, bpy= 2, 2′-bypyridine), is investigated. The reaction of [1] 2+ …

The success of cisplatin and its second-generation derivatives (carboplatin and oxaliplatin)
have inspired chemists to develop new metal-based anticancer agents. 1, 2 Although
ruthenium-based frontrunners, NAMI-A and KP1019, have both failed to end up in the
clinics, ruthenium-based compounds are still subject of intense research. 3-5 A specific
research area is the development of light-activatable ruthenium polypyridyl complexes.
These complexes have been proposed as prodrugs that, upon light irradiation, can be …