Vitamin C preferentially kills cancer stem cells in hepatocellular carcinoma via SVCT-2

SVCT-2 is highly expressed in liver CSCs. a SVCT-2 expression was verified in HCC patient samples by immunoblotting. Samples derived from the same experiment and gels/blots were processed in parallel. b SVCT-2 immunohistochemistry staining in HCC tumor microarray (n？=？104). Staining intensity grade was indicated in the upper right corner. Low SVCT-2 expression: grade 0/1+; high SVCT-2 expression: grade 2+/3+. Scale bars？=？100？μm. c Kaplan–Meier analysis of overall survival in 104 HCC patients according to SVCT-2 expression. d SVCT-2 and Sox-2 expressions were detected by quantitative RT-PCR, followed by correlation analysis in HCC tissues. e Left: correlation analysis of SVCT-2 expressions with Oct-4 or CD133 expressions in HCC tissues. Right: IHC analysis of SVCT-2, Oct-4, and CD133 expressions in HCC tissues. Scale bars？=？100？μm. f, g SVCT-2 is preferentially expressed in tumorspheres generated from HCC cells than nonspheres by qPCR (f) and immunoblotting (g). Samples derived from the same experiment and gels/blots were processed in parallel. h, i Relative expression of SVCT-2 was detected in CD133+ or OV6+ cell populations enriched from HCC cells (h) and HCC samples (i) in comparison to those of CD133？ or OV6？ cell subsets. P peri-tumor, T tumo