The cis isomer is a yellow, air-stable solid that is soluble in some organic solvents.

The cis isomer illustrates linkage isomerism for the DMSO ligand.

[3] The complexes were first prepared in 1971 by heating DMSO solutions of ruthenium trichloride under hydrogen atmosphere.

[4] Modern procedures has been developed which avoids hydrogen gas, either using ascorbic acid or refluxing DMSO to reduce the ruthenium.

[7] Continued research[8][9] has led to the development of several related dmso-containing ruthenium compounds, some of which have undergone early-stage clinical trials.