I am working on a diabetes project, and my mice come from routine lab maintenance. As a result, the timeline between each cage does not align, meaning I may need to perform STZ injections on very different days for different cages. After reviewing the literature, I found that STZ is unstable and is recommended to be used immediately after preparation. However, it is challenging to weigh such a small amount of STZ (e.g., 10 mg) at a time, and frequent opening of the bottle may cause the powder to become wet.
My question is: Since I will only be injecting a few mice at a time, would it be practical to prepare a stock solution of STZ in citric sodium buffer (pH 4.5), store it at 4°C, and use it over a period of time, such as one month or three months?
The molecule half life is very short and for best results after re- hydration used within 12 hours for long duration storages again freeze drying molecule in small doses containers/vials
STZ is better prepared fresh and administered in cold citrate buffer pH4.5. It easily decomposes depending on pH or temperature, turning yellow. The best thing to do is, at each time point when u want to dose the animals, you know the number of animals and the doses each mouse is supposed to receive. So, make a bulk solution and only aliquot the volume of the solution that each animal is supposed to receive depending on the weight then administer. In this way, you will have eliminated weighing errors. If you make a stock solution and store it, your experiment would not be standardized because you can not give some animals a fresh dose and others a dose from a stored stock solution which may have deteriorated to some extent anyway.
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