An unprecedented family of lanthanide-containing coordination polymers with highly tunable emission properties.

Reactions in water between mixtures of rare earth ions (Ln =Y, La-Tm, except Pm) and the sodium salt of terephthalic acid lead to an infinite family of isostructural heteropolynuclear coordination polymers. The monophasic character of the synthesized powders as well as the isostructurality of the heteropolynuclear compounds with the previously described mononuclear [Tb(2)(C(8)H(4)O(4))(3)(H(2)O)(4)](infinity) are ascertained on the basis of the X-ray powder diffraction diagrams. One family of heterodinuclear compounds has been studied in detail, that is, [(La(2-x)Y(x))(C(8)H(4)O(4))(3)(H(2)O)(4)](infinity) with 0 < or = x < or = 2.