Consistently, the Real-Time qPCR results indicated that the mRNA levels of SOX2, OCT4 and Nanog were much higher in DDP-resistant NSCLC cells, instead of DDP-sensitive NSCLC cells (Fig. 5b–d), and CD44+CD166+ cells tended to be enriched in DDP-resistant NSCLC cells, compared to their parental DDP-sensitive counterparts (Fig. 5e). Here, NANOG is linked to non-small cell lung carcinoma.