Molecular level studies with anthracyclines

There is steadily growing interest in the characterization of chemotherapeutic agents at the molecular level. Such characterization ideally involves the elucidation of structural properties such as configuration, conformation and tautomeric or mesomeric form, establishes the effect of chemical substitution on structural properties and provides insight into probable intermolecular interactions that are environmentally dependent. The interpretation of these data can be important for the design of new chemotherapeutic agents. The authors are presently investigating the anthracyclines, particularly members of the daunomycin and nogalamycin families, in an effort to better understand their behaviour at the molecular level. These studies have drawn upon analysis of single crystal structures determined with X-ray diffraction data and solution studies employing ultraviolet and circular dichroism spectroscopies. Crystal structures have been determined for 7-con-O-methylnogarol, 7-deoxynogarol, 9-deacetyldaunomycin, adriamycin-14-valerate (AD-48), and N-trifluoroacetyladriamycin-14-valerate (AD-32). Solution studies have concentrated on the study of the interaction of selected anthracyclines with oligonucleotides of known sequence. The oligonucleotides used were: d-(5GTCATGAC), d-(5GTCGCGAC) and the non-self complementary pair d-(5GTCGTCA) and d-(5TGACGAC).