CD133 and Colorectal Cancer Figure 5. Association of CD133 expression with features of stemness. CD133 gave resistance to staurosporine induced apoptosis. Figure 5a shows that after exposure to staurosporine there were fewer viable cells after transfection with CD133 specific siRNA (HT29CD1332) than with scrambled control (HT29ssc) (p = 0.01). There were no differences between the cells after exposure to DMSO. Figure 5b shows that the CD133+ population of SW480 showed cells showed significantly greater resistance than the CD1332 population (p = 0.008). Figure 5c and 5d show CD133+ cells were significantly more clonogenic than CD1332 cells (p,0.0001 and p,0.003) in 2D and 3D culture respectively. Figures 5e (colonies formed by CD133+ cells) and 5F (colonies formed by CD1332 cells) show that both CD133+ and CD1332 populations of SW480 were able to form colonies from single cells (typical colonies are shown). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0010714.g005 PLoS ONE | www.plosone.org 6 May 2010 | Volume 5 | Issue 5 | e10714