One study demonstrated that in an osteoarthritis model, the overexpression of CXCR7 in chondrocyte cells induced increased expressions of interleukin‐8, osteopontin, matrix metalloproteinases‐2 and vascular endothelial growth factor, which suggests that CXCR7 potentially affected the metastasis of HCC based on the close correlations between these genes and the metastasis of HCC 29. This evidence concerns the gene VEGFA and hepatocellular carcinoma.