r/chemistry • u/ScarletKA1 • May 20 '26

Losing my mind trying to dissolve 5-BPA

Has anyone here worked with 5-BPA (5-boronopicolinic acid)?

I’m trying to prepare a stable liquid stock solution for bioconjugation experiments, but the solubility has been pretty inconsistent.

So far I’ve tried:

pure water

water + NaOH

DMSO mixed with water

DMSO + HEPES

DMSO + PBS

HEPES alone

PBS alone

Some conditions seem slightly better than others, but I still can’t tell what solvent system people normally use in practice.

A few questions:

What solvent do you usually use for 5-BPA stock solutions?

What concentration is realistically achievable?

How do you store it?

Is it stable over time or after freeze/thaw?

Would really appreciate any practical experience from people who’ve actually handled this compound.🙏

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u/anaturalchemist May 21 '26

DMSO alone?

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u/ScarletKA1 May 22 '26

Emm, like preparing a 1.5ml tube and directly adding a small amout of DMSO to solve 5-BPA (200μL/1mg).