The development of drug resistance and severe side-effects has reduced the clinical efficacy of the existing anti-
cancer drugs available in the market. Thus, there is always a constant need to develop newer anti-
cancer drugs with minimal adverse effects. Researchers all over the world have been focusing on various alternative strategies to discover novel, potent, and target specific molecules for
cancer therapy. In this direction, several
heterocyclic compounds are being explored but amongst them one promising heterocycle is
acridone which has attracted the attention of medicinal chemists and gained huge
biological importance as
acridones are found to act on different therapeutically proven molecular targets, overcome
ABC transporters mediated drug resistance and
DNA intercalation in
cancer cells. Some of these
acridone derivatives have reached clinical studies as these heterocycles have shown huge potential in
cancer therapeutics and imaging. Here, the authors have attempted to compile and make some recommendations of
acridone based derivatives concerning their
cancer biological targets and in vitro-cytotoxicity based on
drug design and novelty to increase their therapeutic potential. This review also provides some important insights on the design, receptor targeting and future directions for the development of
acridones as possible clinically effective anti-
cancer agents.