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Divulgação Quim. Nova, Vol. 28, No. 1, 118-129, 2005 CÂNCER E AGENTES ANTINEOPLÁSICOS CICLO-CELULAR ESPECÍFICOS E CICLO-CELULAR NÃO ESPECÍFICOS QUE INTERAGEM COM O DNA: UMA INTRODUÇÃO Vera Lúcia de Almeida, Andrei Leitão, Luisa del Carmen Barrett Reina, Carlos Alberto Montanari e Claudio Luis Donnici* Departamento de Química, Instituto de Ciências Exatas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, CP 702, 31270-901 Belo Horizonte - MG Míriam Teresa Paz Lopes Departamento de Farmacologia, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, CP 702, 31270-901 Belo Horizonte - MG Recebido em 3/2/04; aceito em 19/5/04; publicado na web em 9/9/04 CANCER AND CELL CICLE-SPECIFIC AND CELL CICLE NONSPECIFIC ANTICANCER DNA-INTERACTIVE AGENTS: AN INTRODUCTION. The chemotherapy agents against cancer may be classified as “cell cycle-specific” or “cell cycle-nonspecific”. Nevertheless, several of them have their biological activity related to any kind of action on DNA such as: antimetabolic agents (DNA synthesis inhibition), inherently reactive agents (DNA alkylating electrophilic traps for macromolecular nucleophiles from DNA through inter-strand cross-linking – ISC - alkylation) and intercalating agents (drug-DNA interactions inherent to the binding made due to the agent penetration in to the minor groove of the double helix). The earliest and perhaps most extensively studied and most heavily employed clinical anticancer agents in use today are…