Furthermore, it has recently been found that TSP-1 directly promotes progression of papillary thyroid carcinoma, and namely BRAF(V600E), i.e. the most common somatic mutation in papillary thyroid carcinoma, requires activation of several other genes, including TSP-1, in order to facilitate tumor invasion and metastasis [24,25]. Here, BRAF is linked to thyroid gland papillary carcinoma.