Indole-thiazole hybrids with anticancer potential

Chemotherapeutics play a pivotal role in cancer therapy, but the limitations, such as multidrug resistance, poor selectivity, and severe systemic toxicity, urgently drive the development of novel anticancer agents. Indole derivatives, as privileged pharmacophores in oncology, exhibit inherent anticancer activity by targeting key signaling pathways. The thiazole moiety is widely integrated into anticancer drug design due to its ability to enhance binding affinity to biomolecular targets and improve pharmacokinetic properties. The hybridization of indole with the thiazole scaffold has emerged as a promising strategy to synergize the biological activities of individual pharmacophores, yielding indole-thiazole hybrids with enhanced antiproliferative efficacy, improved target selectivity, and reduced cytotoxicity toward normal cells. This review systematically summarizes the latest advances in the anticancer potential of indole-thiazole hybrids developed since 2021. To delineate the key molecular features that govern the anticancer potency of indole-thiazole hybrids, this review further presents a detailed structure-activity relationship (SARs) analysis; complementing these SARs insights, the review also conducts an in-depth exploration of the mechanisms of action, including their interactions with key biomolecular targets and modulation of oncogenic signaling pathways, to elucidate the molecular basis for their enhanced anticancer efficacy and lay a foundation for rational drug design of next-generation candidates.