In a subsequent study, we found that inhibition of autophagy by downregulation of Atg5 gene expression impaired hepatic differentiation of CK19-positive HPCs in vivo and in vitro, which is in line with previous investigations demonstrating that autophagy impairment inhibits the differentiation of stem cells, including glioma stem/progenitor cells, megakaryocytes and monocyte-macrophages (Zhao et al. 2010; Cao et al. 2015). Here, ATG5 is linked to central nervous system cancer.