SPP1 and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease: One of the major findings of the current work demonstrated that AEBP1 regulates the expression of nine algorithm-predicted target genes that overlapped with our set of fibrosis-specific genes, including AKR1B10, CCDC80, DPT, EFEMP1, ITGBL1, LAMC3, MOXD1, SPP1, and STMN2. We also showed that AEBP1 regulates expression of genes known to play a role in ECM production and maintenance, concordant with recent findings from a comprehensive analysis of AEBP1 in mouse models of NAFLD [10]