Table 1.

Biological role and clinical implications for embryonic stem cell factors in pancreatic cancer

Gene	Biological role/behaviour	PDAC implications	Ref.
OCT4	Overexpressed in 69% of PDAC. Pro-oncogenic role	Correlation with N1/M1 status and indicative of worse prognosis	Polvani et al[47], 2013
	Overexpressed in 48.8% of PDAC. Induces cell proliferation, migration and invasion	Contribution to metastasis and drug resistance	Lu et al[50], 2013
	Overexpressed in human cell lines	Multidrug resistance and metastasis	Wang et al[52], 2013
	Induction of tumorigenic capacity	Chemo-resistance	Wang et al[53], 2013
	Overexpressed in 79.2% metaplastic ducts	Early carcinogenesis and worse prognosis	Wen et al[49], 2010
SOX2	Overexpressed in poorly differentiated human tumors	Correlation to aggressiveness	Sanada et al[54], 2006
	Ectopic expression in 19.3% of PDAC. Promotes cancer cell proliferation/dedifferentiation	Rapid tumor progression and poor differentiation	Herreros-Villanueva et al[38], 2013
	Induction of tumorigenic capacity	Chemo-resistance	Wang et al[53], 2013
NANOG	Overexpressed in 53.5% of PDAC. Induces proliferation, migration and invasion	Associated with eraly stage carcinogenesis and worse overall survival	Lu et al[50], 2013
	Overexpressed in cells capable of initiating spheres	Resistance to 5-FU treatment	Lonardo et al[68], 2013
	Overexpressed in pancreatic tumors	Contribution to carcinogenesis and correlates to worse prognosis	Wen et al[49], 2010

PDAC: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.