Oxidative DNA cleavage by Schiff base tetraazamacrocyclic oxamido nickel(II) complexes

Nickel is considered a weak carcinogen. Some researches have shown that bound proteins or synthetic ligands may increase the toxic effect of nickel ions. A systematic study of ligand effects on the interaction between nickel complexes and DNA is necessary. Here, we compared the interactions between DNA and six closely related Schiff base tetraazamacrocyclic oxamido nickel(II) complexes NiL1−3a,1−3b. The structure of one of the six complexes, NiL3b has been characterized by single crystal X-ray analysis. All of the complexes can cleave plasmid DNA under physiological conditions in the presence of H2O2. NiL3b shows the highest DNA cleavage activity. It can convert supercoiled DNA to nicked DNA then linear DNA in a sequential manner as the complex concentration or reaction time is increased. The cleavage reaction is a typical pseudo-first-order consecutive reaction with the rate constants of 3.27 ± 0.14 h−1 (k1) and 0.0966 ± 0.0042 h−1 (k2), respectively, when a complex concentration of 0.6 mM is used. The cleavage mechanism between the complex and plasmid DNA is likely to involve hydroxyl radicals as reactive oxygen species. Circular dichronism (CD), fluorescence spectroscopy and gel electrophoresis indicate that the complexes bind to DNA by partial intercalative and groove binding modes, but these binding interactions are not the dominant factor in determining the DNA cleavage abilities of the complexes.