CTNNB1 and hepatocellular carcinoma: HBx protein has now been extensively shown to promote tumor growth and resistance to therapy in human HCC through modulating apoptosis, telomerase activity, nucleotide excision repair, cell cycle, cell adhesion, epigenetics, etc. More recent studies have also found HBx to induce tumorigenicity of hepatic progenitor cells in DDC-treated HBx transgenic mice [24], to inhibit cell differentiation in hepatic progenitor cells [39] and to play an anti-apoptosis role in hepatic progenitor cells by activating the Wnt/beta-catenin pathway [40].