HBEGF and thyroid gland carcinoma: Furthermore, the ectodomain shedding of HB-EGF by disintegrin and metalloproteases has been reported to be a key event of receptor cross talk, as well as a novel intercellular signaling by their carboxy-terminal fragments to regulate gene expression directly (51), which could support our data that HB-EGF regulates thyroid cancer cell growth and invasion.