Taken together, these findings suggest that p38 inhibits the stemness properties of NSCLC cells by inducing the MK2-mediateed phosphorylation of Hsp27 at Ser78 and Ser82, which in turn enhances the binding to Hsp27 to the stemness proteins and promotes the proteasomal degradation of these stemness proteins. Here, MAPK14 is linked to non-small cell lung carcinoma.