POU5F1 and hepatocellular carcinoma: To confirm the role of CRBP-1 in the process of regulating HCC cancer cell stemness, mRNA levels of stem cell markers CD133, OCT4 and SOX2 was found dramatically decreased in CRBP-1 overexpressed PLC/PRF/5 cells compared to the control by using qPCR (Fig. 3C).