Abstract

A series of di- and triorganotin 3,6-dioxaheptanoates and 3,6,9-trioxadecanoates were synthesized and characterized by H1, C13 and S117n NMR, electrospray mass and S119mn Mössbauer spectroscopy, as well as elemental analysis. Their in vitro antitumour activity against seven tumoural cell lines of human origin, two breast cancers (MCF-7, EVSA-T), a colon carcinoma (WiDr), an ovarian cancer (IGROV), a melanoma (M 19 MEL), a renal cancer (A 498) and a non small cell lung cancer (H 226), is reported. They are characterized by similar inhibition doses ID50 as the analogous di- and triorganotin derivatives of 4-carboxybenzo-15-crown-5 and -18-crown-6 and in some cases by much lower ID50 values than clinically used reference compounds such as doxorubicine and methotrexate.