Fig. 4: Germ cell-like cells are enriched in diverse human cancer cell lines.

a Immunofluorescence assay showed that expression and colocalization of Oct4 and DAZL in a subset of cultured p53^+/+ HCT116 cells. b The percentages of Ifitm3⁺ cells in diverse cancer cell lines with or without p53 were analyzed by flow cytometry (n = 3). c Diverse cancer cell lines were injected subcutaneously into nude mice (1 × 10⁵ cells/mouse), and tumors were collected for H&E staining. The incidence for liver-like tissues, pancreas-like tissues, and cartilage-like tissues was counted. Representative tumor sections from PC3 cells stained with H&E were shown. d The ratio of ifitm3⁺ in the isogenic wild-type and p53^−/− HCT116 cancer cell lines was analyzed by flow cytometry (n = 5), **p < 0.01. e The relative expression of a series of germ cell-related markers in paired p53^+/+ and p53^−/− HCT116 cells was analyzed by RT-PCR. f The plot showed the tumor growth curve from nude mice injected with p53^−/− HCT116 and p53^+/+ HCT116 cells. g The relative ratio of Ifitm3⁺ in p53^−/− HCT116 cells with or without p53 restoration from multiple single-cell clones was analyzed by flow cytometry (n = 12). **p < 0.01. h The relative ratio of Ifitm3⁺ cells in RKO cells with control or p53 knockdown was analyzed by flow cytometry (n = 3). **p < 0.01. Tumor volume from nude mice injected subcutaneously with RKO cells with control or p53 knockdown was shown (n = 3). **p < 0.01. i A total of 100 Ifitm3⁺ cells isolated from diverse cancer cell lines were injected subcutaneously into nude mice for tumorigenicity assay (n = 5). The tumor sections from PC3 cells were stained with H&E (scale bar = 20 μm)