Western blotting assays showed that CXCL3 was differentially expressed in the 8 analyzed HCC cell lines, and a relatively high expression level of CXCL3 was observed in Hep3B, Huh7 and PLC/PRF/5 cells, which had high expression levels of CD133 (Fig. 1a)7, 8. The gene discussed is CXCL3; the disease is hepatocellular carcinoma.