Interaction of dinuclear cadmium(II) 5-Cl-salicylaldehyde complexes with calf-thymus DNA.

Five dinuclear Cd(II) complexes with the anion of 5-Cl-salicylaldehyde (5-Cl-saloH) were synthesized in the absence or presence of the α-diimines: 2,2'-bipyridine (bipy), 1,10-phenanthroline (phen), 2,9-dimethyl-1,10-phenanthroline (neoc) or 2,2'-dipyridylamine (dpamH) and characterized as [Cd(5-Cl-salo)2(CH3OH)]2 (1), [Cd(5-Cl-salo)2(bipy)]2 (2), [Cd(5-Cl-salo)2(phen)]2 (3), [Cd(5-Cl-salo)(neoc)(ONO2)]2 (4) and [Cd(5-Cl-salo)(dpamΗ)(ONO2)]2 (5). The complexes were characterized by spectroscopic techniques (IR, UV-vis, (1)H-NMR and (13)C-NMR), elemental analysis and molar conductivity measurements. The structures of four complexes (1-3 and 5) were determined by X-ray crystallography, providing all three possible coordination modes of the ligand 5-Cl-salicylaldehyde, i.e. bidentate or tridentate chelating and/or bridging mode. The complexes bind to calf-thymus (CT) DNA mainly by intercalation, as concluded by the viscosity measurements and present relatively high DNA-binding constants. The complexes exhibit significant ability to displace ethidium bromide (EB) from the EB-DNA complex, thus indirectly proving the intercalation as the most possible binding mode to CT DNA.