We divided the ESCC tissues into high and low expression groups based on the immunoreactivity of PAI-1 in stromal cells and LRP1 in either cancer cells [LRP1 (CA)] or stromal cells [LRP1 (ST)] (Fig. 6a, b, c, d) and confirmed that stromal cells, including CD204+ TAMs, expressed LRP1 in human ESCC tissue by double immunofluorescence (Fig. 6e). This evidence concerns the gene SERPINE1 and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.