A series of bimetallic ruthenium complexes [(bpy)(2)Ru(bpy)(CH(2))(n)(bpy)Ru(bpy)(2)](4+) (1, where bpy is 2,2'-bipyridinyl, n = 3, 5, 8) for the coreactant electrochemiluminescence (ECL) system have been synthesized. Their ECL property at different working electrode has been studied in 0.1 M phosphate buffer by using tripropylamine (TPrA) and 2-(dibutylamino) ethanol (DBAE) as the coreactant. The results demonstrate that the ECL intensity depends largely on the length of the saturated carbon chain linkage: the longer is the carbon chain, the higher is the ECL intensity. A remarkable ECL enhancement (up to about 25 times), in comparison with the commonly used metallic [Ru(bpy)(3)](2+), has been observed from 1c (n = 8) at Pt electrode. With 20 mM TPrA, the log of the ECL intensity increases linearly with the log of complex 1c concentrations over the concentration range of 1.0 x 10(-16) to 1.0 x 10(-6) M at glassy carbon electrode. The detection limit is 1.0 x 10(-16) M at a signal-to-noise ratio of 3. This is the highest ECL detection limit for bimetallic system reported until now. The study provides a general methodology to further improve and tune the ECL efficiency by using multimetallic ruthenium complexes.