Novel phosphoramidates with porphine and nitrogenous drug: one-pot synthesis and orientation to cancer cells.

One-pot synthesis of novel phosphoramidates with porphine and nitrogenous drug was accomplished. In the absence of light, MTT test showed that they killed the BEL-7402 liver cancer cells effectively in vitro. The cell viability studied on normal liver and cancer cells showed that porphine phosphoramidates selectively kill the cancer cells, which was in sharp contrast with the non-porphine containing compound 4-formylphenyl N,N-bis(2-chloroethyl)-phosphoramidate. These results, coupled with the cell uptake test showing that they could differentiate the tumor cells from the normal cells by their selective accumulation in cancer cells, gave strong support to the notion that the introduction of porphine moiety in these molecules was responsible for the effectiveness and cell differentiability of these porphine phosphoramidates.