AKT1 and hepatocellular carcinoma: The PI3K/AKT signaling pathway is important in angiogenesis; to investigate the role of the PI3K/AKT signaling pathway in KLF8-mediated VEGFA up-regulation, the KLF8 expression plasmid pCDNA3.1-KLF8 was transfected into the SMMC7721 HCC cell line to up-regulate KLF8 expression, and the pCDNA3.1 plasmid was transfected as a control.