Bob Anderson, Dan Li and Francis Hunter published a paper entitled ‘Antagonism in effectiveness of evofosfamide and doxorubicin through intermolecular electron transfer’
In this paper they showed that the radical anion of evofosfamide undergoes electron transfer to doxorubicin in kinetic competition to fragmentation of the radical anion, thus suppressing the release the cytotoxic mustard. This electron transfer process may account, at least in part, for the lack of overall survival improvement in a recent clinical trial. This study underlines the need to consider both redox and electron transfer chemistry when combining bioreductive prodrugs with other redox-active drugs in cancer treatment. (IF = 5.6).