IGF-1 LR3 Reconstitution: Water for 0.1 and 1 mg Vials

How much water an IGF-1 LR3 vial takes, what concentration each volume gives, and why a microgram compound in a small vial is the hardest draw to read.

Medibact Guides · Published 2026-09-20

Illustration: A clear glass vial with white lyophilized powder on a white lab bench. — Illustration

IGF-1 LR3 arrives in the smallest vials on this site — 0.1 mg and 1 mg — and is discussed in micrograms. That combination makes reconstitution arithmetic unusually consequential: the difference between one water volume and another is the difference between a draw of two units and a draw of forty, for exactly the same amount of peptide. This page reports what each volume produces, what a U-100 syringe reads at each concentration, how many amounts a vial holds, and the labelled mixing procedure for a lyophilized peptide, since this compound has none of its own. It reports and does not recommend.

The IGF-1 LR3 calculator runs the same sums for any vial and volume; the sourced dose figures and their provenance are on the IGF-1 LR3 dosage page, and every compound's arithmetic is indexed on the reconstitution hub.

Water per vial and the concentration it gives

One U-100 unit is a hundredth of a millilitre. The 0.5 mL row is not a calculator preset; it is included because it is the volume that keeps a small vial's draws readable without exceeding what the vial holds.

Vial	Water added	Concentration	Micrograms per unit
0.1 mg	0.5 mL	200 mcg/mL	2
0.1 mg	1 mL	100 mcg/mL	1
0.1 mg	2 mL	50 mcg/mL	0.5
1 mg	1 mL	1,000 mcg/mL	10
1 mg	2 mL	500 mcg/mL	5
1 mg	3 mL	333 mcg/mL	3.33
1 mg	5 mL	200 mcg/mL	2

The last row and the first produce the same solution, 200 mcg/mL, from vials that differ tenfold — 5 mL of water into the larger, half a millilitre into the smaller. That is the clearest demonstration of what reconstitution actually decides: concentration is the vial amount divided by the volume, and two entirely different vials meet at the same reading when the division comes out the same.

Bacteriostatic Water

USP-grade, 0.9% benzyl alcohol, 30 mL multi-dose vial. Research use only.

$30.99

Buy at Medibact

What each amount comes to in units

The columns are the range circulating for this compound, 20 to 100 mcg a day, as recorded in this site's dosage chart on 2026-09-18.

Vial and water	mcg/mL	20 mcg	50 mcg	100 mcg
0.1 mg in 0.5 mL	200	10 units	25	50
0.1 mg in 1 mL	100	20	50	100
0.1 mg in 2 mL	50	40	100	200
1 mg in 1 mL	1,000	2	5	10
1 mg in 2 mL	500	4	10	20
1 mg in 3 mL	333	6	15	30
1 mg in 5 mL	200	10	25	50

Read down the 20 mcg column and the spread is twentyfold, from two units to forty, with the same twenty micrograms in every row. A U-100 syringe is marked in whole units and can be read to about half of one, so at the top of that column a half-unit error is a quarter of the amount and at the bottom it is one fortieth. Nothing about the peptide changes across those rows. This is the single most useful thing the arithmetic says about a microgram compound, and it is why the 200 rows exist at all.

The bottom of the column has its own limit: 100 mcg at 50 mcg/mL is 200 units, two full 1 mL syringes for one amount. Between the unreadable and the unholdable, the workable band for this compound is roughly 200 to 1,000 mcg/mL.

How much a vial holds

The vial's milligrams set the number of amounts, and water never changes it:

Vial	20 mcg draws	50 mcg draws	100 mcg draws
0.1 mg	5	2	1
1 mg	50	20	10

A 0.1 mg vial is a single 100 mcg amount. That is worth stating plainly, because a vial that holds one draw and a vial that holds fifty are sold under the same name and described with the same microgram figures, and only the milligram line on the label distinguishes them.

The labelled procedure, borrowed from a product that has one

No IGF-1 LR3 vial carries instructions, so what follows is the procedure a regulator approved for a different lyophilized peptide, quoted rather than adapted. EGRIFTA WR's prescribing information directs that the vial is reconstituted with the Bacteriostatic Water for Injection supplied, 1.3 mL into one vial giving 8 mg per mL; that the vial is moved in a circle — swirled — and not shaken; that the solution is inspected and not used if solid particles appear or it is cloudy or coloured; and that unused solution is discarded seven days after mixing. Each of those four elements describes a manufactured product with a known identity, a known fill and a validated shelf life after mixing, which is precisely what a research vial does not have. The general mixing procedure, and storage after it, are covered on medibact.com's reconstitution guide.

What is being dissolved

Two published analyses looked inside vials sold under this name. A German doping-control laboratory characterised the contents of one as Long-R3-IGF-I carrying a six-histidine purification tag joined to the C-terminus by a Leu-Glu linker — a form produced for biochemical studies, the authors concluding that the product may be a by-product of that work and that the effects of the tagged form in humans have not been elucidated. The French anti-doping laboratory, validating a detection method in 2021, reported abundant oxidised forms of the peptide in black-market products, in amounts that forced the method to monitor the oxidised form alongside the native one.

Neither finding changes any arithmetic on this page — a milligram of powder divided by a millilitre of water is a milligram per millilitre whatever the powder turns out to be. They change what the arithmetic is about, which is a different and larger point: concentration is knowable, identity is not, and the second is not improved by being precise about the first.

What this page does not do

It does not state how much IGF-1 LR3 to use, or a frequency, or a route, and it does not tell anyone how to inject anything. It reports water volumes, the concentration each produces, the micrograms in one U-100 unit at each concentration, how many amounts a vial holds, and a labelled procedure from a product that has one. Decisions about administering anything to a person belong with a clinician.

Sources and dates

Opened 2026-09-20: the DailyMed SPL search API for IGF-1 LR3 and mecasermin, with the INCRELEX label from Eton Pharmaceuticals (published 2026-05-20, sections 2.2 and 3) and the EGRIFTA WR prescribing information from Theratechnologies (published 2026-08-03, section 2.2) read in full; PubMed through the NCBI E-utilities for the analogue's name forms in title or abstract (78 records; 25 with the human tag), with the abstracts of PMIDs 33587816 and 20675162 read; the ClinicalTrials.gov v2 API for IGF-1 LR3 as an intervention (no records); MedlinePlus, "Giving an insulin injection" (reviewed 2024-07-21). The circulating microgram figures are as recorded in this site's dosage chart on 2026-09-18. Corrections go to the contact page.

Bacteriostatic Water

USP-grade, 0.9% benzyl alcohol, 30 mL multi-dose vial. Research use only.

$30.99

Buy at Medibact

Medibact Guides facts

IGF-1 LR3 research vials are 0.1 mg and 1 mg, the two sizes this site's calculator is preset to — among the smallest vial amounts on the site, which is what makes the arithmetic here different from a 10 mg peptide vial.
No label exists for an IGF-1 LR3 vial anywhere: DailyMed held no record on 2026-09-20, and the French anti-doping laboratory records that IGF-1's analogues were never approved for human use (Drug Test Anal, PMID 33587816, 2021). Every water volume below is arithmetic, not an instruction from a manufacturer.
The closest labelled reference point is a different molecule. Mecasermin, recombinant human IGF-1, is supplied as INCRELEX at 40 mg in 4 mL — 10 mg/mL (Eton Pharmaceuticals label on DailyMed, published 2026-05-20, read 2026-09-20). Reaching that concentration from a 1 mg research vial would require 0.1 mL of water, a volume no one can add or recover accurately, so the reference is worth knowing and not worth matching.
At the calculator's volumes a 1 mg vial gives 1,000, 500 and 333 mcg/mL in 1, 2 and 3 mL, so one U-100 unit holds 10, 5 and 3.33 mcg; a 0.1 mg vial in the same volumes gives 100, 50 and 33.3 mcg/mL, and one unit holds 1, 0.5 and 0.33 mcg (arithmetic, this page).
One U-100 unit is a hundredth of a millilitre (MedlinePlus, 'Giving an insulin injection', reviewed 2024-07-21). That is the constant every row here rests on, and it is why the same microgram amount can be 2 units or 40 depending only on the water.
The figures circulating for this vial are 20 to 100 mcg a day, as recorded in this site's dosage chart on 2026-09-18. At 1 mg in 1 mL those are 2 to 10 units — small enough that a half-unit reading error is 25% of a 20 mcg draw, and the reason more water rather than less is what makes a small amount measurable.
The number of amounts a vial holds is set by the milligrams alone and never by the water: a 1 mg vial is 50 draws of 20 mcg or 10 of 100 mcg at any concentration, and a 0.1 mg vial is 5 draws of 20 mcg. The water decides only how many units each draw reads (arithmetic, this page).
A labelled mixing procedure for a lyophilized peptide, quoted here because no IGF-1 LR3 vial has one: EGRIFTA WR is reconstituted with the Bacteriostatic Water for Injection supplied, 1.3 mL into one vial for 8 mg per mL, the vial moved in a circle rather than shaken, the solution inspected and not used if it is cloudy, coloured or holds particles, and discarded seven days after mixing (EGRIFTA WR prescribing information, DailyMed, published 2026-08-03, section 2.2).
What is being dissolved may not be what the label says. The one published analysis of an individual black-market vial found Long-R3-IGF-I carrying a six-histidine purification tag — a form made for biochemical work (Growth Horm IGF Res, PMID 20675162, 2010) — and the 2021 anti-doping method paper reports abundant oxidised peptide forms in the products it examined.

Frequently asked questions

How much bacteriostatic water goes into a 1 mg IGF-1 LR3 vial?

No label sets it, because no IGF-1 LR3 vial has a label. The calculator's presets are 1, 2 and 3 mL, giving 1,000, 500 and 333 mcg/mL, and one U-100 unit holds 10, 5 and 3.33 mcg at those volumes. The choice changes only the size of the reading: at 1 mL a 20 mcg amount is two units, at 3 mL it is six. The milligram in the vial is the same either way.

What concentration does a 0.1 mg vial give?

100 mcg/mL in 1 mL, 50 mcg/mL in 2 mL and 33.3 mcg/mL in 3 mL — so one unit holds 1, 0.5 and 0.33 mcg. A 0.1 mg vial is one tenth the amount of a 1 mg vial, so at the same water volume every draw reads ten times larger in units for the same micrograms. In 0.5 mL it gives 200 mcg/mL, which is the row that keeps a 20 mcg amount at a readable ten units without using more water than the vial holds.

How many units is 50 mcg of IGF-1 LR3?

From a 1 mg vial: 5 units in 1 mL, 10 in 2 mL, 15 in 3 mL and 25 in 5 mL. From a 0.1 mg vial: 50 units in 1 mL, which is half a syringe, and 100 units in 2 mL, which is a full one. A unit figure quoted without both the vial size and the water volume cannot be converted into micrograms by anyone, which is why every table here carries all three columns.

Can a research vial be reconstituted to the Increlex concentration?

Arithmetically yes, practically no. INCRELEX is 10 mg/mL, so a 1 mg vial would need 0.1 mL — a tenth of a millilitre added to a vial and drawn back out again, with the losses that implies. A 0.1 mg vial would need 0.01 mL, one syringe unit. The comparison is useful for a different reason: it shows that the approved product is far more concentrated than anything a small research vial produces at a workable volume, so unit counts taken from that label do not transfer here.

How many doses does an IGF-1 LR3 vial hold?

At the amounts that circulate for it, a 1 mg vial holds 50 draws of 20 mcg, 20 of 50 mcg or 10 of 100 mcg, and a 0.1 mg vial holds a tenth of each — 5, 2 or 1. Those counts come from the milligrams and do not change with the water. What the water changes is whether each draw is two units or forty, and therefore how much of it a misreading costs.

Is IGF-1 LR3 reconstituted differently from other peptides?

The procedure is the same as for any lyophilized peptide; what differs is that the amounts are micrograms and the vials are the smallest on this site, so the tolerance for a reading error is tighter. The labelled procedure for a lyophilized peptide — add the stated volume, swirl rather than shake, inspect before use, discard after the labelled period — is quoted above from EGRIFTA WR, because no vial of this compound carries instructions of its own. Which solvent a vendor specifies, and how it differs from bacteriostatic water, is covered on medibact.com rather than here.