Highly Stable Phenanthridinium Frameworks as a New Class of Tunable DNA Binding Agents with Cytotoxic Properties

A new class of cytotoxic heteroaromatic cations is
presented, based on the dihydro-imidazo-phenanthridinium
framework (DIP), that have affinity for DNA and cytotoxicity
toward cancerous cells. The DIP framework is particularly
tunable due to the flexible synthetic methodology. Furthermore, the central moiety has proved to be very stable to
hydrolysis and reduction compared to other phenanthridinium-based agents.