Novel ruthenium complexes and their applications as catalysts and anticancer agents

Firstly, I thank Patrick for giving me the opportunity of spending these years in his lab, for sharing his knowledge, for his invaluable guidance, help and support and, no less importantly, for making my time with the McGowan group such an enjoyable experience. Thank you to TSB for the funding and to all the members of the Cp* project. Particularly, thank you to John, for all the meetings and advice and to Tom and Ben for their help with the hydrogenations. Many thanks to Christopher Pask for basically everything, from very constructive discussions to disgusting pump-oil changing. We miss you upstairs. Special thanks go to the technical staff at Leeds, including Colin Kilner, Simon Barrett, Tanya Marinko-Covell and Ian Blakeley, who provided analyses and characterisation data. Chapter 6 would not have been possible without the efforts of our “Bradford team”: Rianne and Aida, I cannot thank you enough. Thank you also to the iPRD members, mainly Peter Baldwin for testing some of my compounds against racemisations and James Tunstall for his patience with the “delicate” GC machine. Thanks to all the people in the McGowan and Halcrow groups (past and present) for the fun. I will probably forget someone, but I have to mention Joel and Alun (for sharing the “ruthenium joy”), Chris, Felix (endless knowledge of everything technology-related), Steph, Rianne, Aida, Carlo, Andrew, Zary, Ben, Jonathan, Laurence, Amedeo, Rufeida, Tom, and many masters students. Outside the lab, for their help with X-ray crystallography, I would like to thank James and Ben, and all the people involved in the McGowan-Willans-Kee group meetings for listening and sharing ideas. Leo, thank you for your affection, for your constant encouragement and for many beautiful moments. You have given these years the best possible soundtrack. Finally, I have to thank my family and, above all, my parents for their unconditional support and for being always present despite the distance. For so much effort... Gracias.