Andreia Valente is an Assistant Researcher at Centro de Química Estrutural at Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa. Presently, A. Valente leads theDrug Discovery and Delivery Systems research line at FCUL that has formed several undergraduate students (through their final Graduation Project), 15 M.Sc. and Ph.D. (ongoing). She was granted with a Royal Society of Chemistry Research Fund Grant in 2015 and she is at the present PI of a funded project in the area of medicinal chemistry and a WG Member of the COST action CA17104 “New diagnostic and therapeutic tools against multidrug resistant tumors”, having participated

 

 

Statement of the Problem: The discovery of new active and selective anticancer agents, able to reduce the noxious side effects of the chemotherapeutics in clinical use, and able to overcome resistance mechanisms, is the main goal for the research in this field. Methodology & Theoretical Orientation: We have been developing new of [Ru(η 5 -C 5 H 5 )(2,2′-bipyridine- R)(PPh 3 )] + based compounds through structure-activity studies, endowed with specific targeting components to take advantage of the singular characteristics of tumor cells and tissues, such as their permeability to macromolecules and overexpression of receptors.Thus, when in the structure of our compounds R is a biodegradable and biocompatible polymer and or a biomolecule recognized by cancer cells, passive and/or active targeting can be achieved, respectively.