Abstract
In the face of the recent pandemic and emergence of infectious diseases of viral origin, research on parasitic diseases such as malaria continues to remain critical and innovative methods are required to target the rising widespread resistance that renders conventional therapies unusable. The prolific use of auxiliary metallo-fragments has augmented the search for novel drug regimens in an attempt to combat rising resistance. The development of organometallic compounds (those containing metal-carbon bonds) as antimalarial drugs has been exemplified by the clinical development of ferroquine in the nascent field of Bioorganometallic Chemistry. With their inherent physicochemical properties, organometallic complexes can modulate the discipline of chemical biology by proffering different modes of action and targeting various enzymes. With the beneficiation of platinum group metals (PGMs) in mind, this review aims to describe recent studies on the antimalarial activity of PGM-based organometallic complexes. This review does not provide an exhaustive coverage of the literature but focusses on recent advances of bioorganometallic antimalarial drug leads, including a brief mention of recent trends comprising interactions with biomolecules such as heme and intracellular catalysis. This resource can be used in parallel with complementary reviews on metal-based complexes tested against malaria.
Highlights
The turn of the 21st century has seen great developments and efforts directed toward containing and eradicating the spread of infectious diseases around the globe
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Summary
The turn of the 21st century has seen great developments and efforts directed toward containing and eradicating the spread of infectious diseases around the globe. PGM complexes are a diverse group of compounds, which can be fine-tuned, resulting in widespread potential applications These complexes have been the subject of much research interest within fields of catalysis and biomedical applications, cancer, having reported many success stories [10,11]. The introduction of PGM moieties into known pharmacological scaffolds, possessing antiplasmodial activity, has been shown to enhance the biological activity of these organic compounds This approach offers an opportunity to restore the activity of antimalarial drugs, already suffering full-blown clinical resistance, while displaying increased activity toward resistant P. falciparum strains [18,19,20]. With respect to current trends in research activities on PGM complexes, we have emphasized recent developments within this field published over the past five years
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