Cells, tissues and reagents
Four NPC cell lines (C17, C666, NPC43-ve and NPC43+ve), kindly provided
by Professor George Tsao were cultured with RPMI1640 medium (Invitrogen)
supplemented with 10 % FBS, 1 %
P/S and 4 µM Y27632 ROCK inhibitor (Enzo Life Sciences,. ALX-270-333).
NPC tissue samples used in this study were obtained from patients
admitted to Queen Mary Hospital, the University of Hong Kong. Tissues
were fixed and subjected to histological examination. The study has been
approved by the Institutional Review Board of The University of Hong
Kong/Hospital Authority Hong Kong West Cluster (HKU/HA HKW IRB,
UW16-428).
IDX (provided by Noxopharm Limited, Australia) was suspended in DMSO at
40 mg/mL (stock solution) and stored at –80 °C. Serial dilutions of the
stock solution were freshly prepared in complete medium and kept for
less than 4 weeks at -20 °C. In all cultures, the final concentration of
DMSO in the medium was ≤0.1%.