Western blot analysis of fresh colorectal tumor and adjacent non-tumor tissues from 7 patients with colorectal cancer revealed that GLUT1, HK2, PKM2, LDHA, ASCT2, GLS1, β-catenin and c-Myc increased significantly in colorectal carcinomas tissues compared with normal colorectal tissues, and there exists a negative correlation between the expression of NDRG2 and target molecules in colorectal tissues (Figure 5C and Supplementary Figure S7). Here, HK2 is linked to colorectal cancer.