Synthesis, immunomodulation and cytotoxic effects of vanadium (IV) complexes

Vanadium is known to exhibit several bioactivities and shows potential as a pharmaceutical drug. The current studies were conducted with the goal of synthesizing a new generation of oxovanadium(IV) complexes, investigating their effects on cancer cell proliferation and their immunomodulatory properties, and predicting possible structure activity relationships. The elucidation of the structures of the synthesized complexes was achieved using elemental analysis, conductivity measurements, magnetic property measurements, and IR and electronic spectroscopies. These studies suggest that the synthesized complexes have a binuclear structure. All of the complexes were evaluated on different cancer cell lines, including HeLa, PC-3, and C33A, and on the normal 3T3 fibroblast cells. Some of the compounds exhibited prominent inhibitory activities on the cervical cancer cell lines and the prostate cancer PC-3 cells. The immunomodulatory activity of the vanadium compounds was evaluated on human phagocytes for ROS (reactive oxygen species) production using luminol- and lucigenin-based chemiluminescence assays. No potent effect was exerted by the majority of the tested compounds on whole blood oxidative burst activity. A study of human T-cells proliferation in vitro on vanadium complexes was also conducted. The majority of the compounds were observed to exhibit potent inhibitory effects. The superoxide, nitric oxide and DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) radical scavenging properties were also determined.