Towards ruthenium(ii) polypyridine complexes with prolonged and predetermined excited state lifetimesElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available: synthesis of the new ligands bpy–pyr and pyr–bpy–pyr and of their ruthenium compounds. See http://www.rsc.org/suppdata/cc/b1/b110291e/

The excited state lifetime of a Ru(bpy)3-motif is linearly related to the number of appended pyrenyl chromophores, but independent of connectivity; values for nine complexes range from 0.8 to 18.1 microseconds.