Cellular viability assay

Cellular proliferative capacity was analyzed using MTT (Sigma-Aldrich; Merck KGaA) based on the ability of living cells to convert tetrazolium salts to formazan. Briefly, cells were seeded into 96-well culture plates at a density of 1.6×10⁴ per well in 200 µl media. After culturing for 24 h at 37°C, the media were replaced with FBS-free media for 24 h. The cells were then treated with 0.1, 0.5, 2.5, 5 and 10 µM albendazole or the vehicle control (DMSO), and then cultured for a further 24 h. The treatment concentration of albendazole was determined by referring to previous reports (12,20). The media were then replaced with fresh media containing 100 µl MTT (diluted to 0.5 mg/ml in FBS-free medium from a 5 mg/ml stock solution) and incubated at 37°C for 3 h. The supernatant was removed and 100 µl DMSO was added to each well to dissolve the formazan crystals. The absorbance was read at 470 nm using a microplate reader (BioTek Instruments, Inc.), and all treatments were performed in triplicate.