Pyridine-based lanthanide complexes: towards bimodal agents operating as near infrared luminescent and MRI reporters

We report two prototype Ln(3+) complexes that address requirements for both MRI and luminescence imaging and we demonstrate that the presence of two H2O molecules bound to the Ln(3+), beneficial for MRI applications of the Gd3+ analogue, is not a major limitation for the development of NIR luminescent agents.