Synthesis of four derivatives of 3,6,10-tri(carboxymethyl)-3,6,10-triazadodecanedioic acid, the stabilities of their complexes with Ca(ii), Cu(ii), Zn(ii) and lanthanide(iii) and water-exchange investigations of Gd(iii) chelatesElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available: tables of pM values and relaxivities; potentiometric titration curves for TTDA-PY, TTDA-HP, TTDA-H1P and TTDA-H2P; species distribution curves, plots of temperature dependence of transverse electronic relaxation rates and plots of pH dependence of conditional stability constants for Gd complexes of all four ligands and TTDA; 1H NMR and COSY spectra of [La(TTDA-HP)]–. See http://www.rsc.org/suppdata/dt/b1/b107456n/