Antimicrobial activity of ruthenium-based intercalators

Multidrug resistance of bacterial pathogens is a major problem and there is a clear need for the development of new types of antibiotics. Here we investigated the antimicrobial activity of ruthenium(II) based DNA-intercalating complexes. These complexes were found to have no activity in vitro against the Gram-negative bacterium Escherichia coli, but the complexes were clearly active against the Gram-positive bacteria Bacillus subtilis and Staphylococcus aureus. In vivo activity has also been demonstrated for one of the compounds using a simple infection model, the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Importantly, this also showed that the compound tested was not toxic to the nematodes.