Complexes control nitric oxide release

Abstract

Chemists have developed a family of complexes of nitric oxide with nucleophiles that are effective agents for the controlled biological release of nitric oxide. The compounds may form the basis of a new class of drugs and are likely to be useful to scientists who are probing the ubiquitous biological functions of nitric oxide. The compounds, which are salts containing anions with the general formula X-[N(O)NO], were described in a symposium sponsored by the Medicinal Chemistry Division by Larry K. Keefer, chief of the chemistry section of the Laboratory of Comparative Carcinogenesis, National Cancer Institute, Frederick, Md. Keefer refers to the compounds as NONOates. Keefer points out that nitric oxide recently has been found to be involved in a variety of biological processes, including normal physiological control of blood pressure, macrophage-induced cytostasis and cytotoxicity, and neurotransmission. Reefer's group reported last year that nitric oxide also deaminates DNA bases and is a mutagen in liv...