Synthesis, structure investigation and biological evaluation of 2-thiophene N(4)-phenylthiosemicarbazone and its three metal derivatives

• Heterocyclic thiosemicarbazone.
• Cytotoxic studies.
• Hirshfeld surface.
• Fingerprint plots.

A 2-thiophene N(4)-phenylthiosemicarbazone (HL) ligand and its three metal derivatives [CuL2 ] (1), [NiL2] (2) and [PdL2] (3) are synthesized and characterized by elemental analysis, IR spectra, mass spectra as well as the single-crystal X-ray diffraction. Compounds 1–3 have the identical architectures in which the Schiff bases L− ions act as the bibasic chelating ligands with thiolate S and imine N atoms as the donor sites. Cytotoxic studies carried out in vitro against human liver hepatocellular carcinoma HepG2 cells and human normal hepatocyte QSG7701 cells show that 1 can be able to inhibit cell proliferation growth. Compound 1 promotes a dose-dependent apoptosis in HepG2 cells. The potential structure-activity relationships among HL and 1–3 are further investigated by Hirshfeld surface combining fingerprint plots.