TIMP1 and neoplasm: Although TIMP-1 has been expected to inhibit tumorigenesis, progression and metastasis by blocking the matrix-degrading properties of endopeptidases (Bourboulia & Stetler-Stevenson, 2010), its overexpression in tumour recently showed protease-independent roles in proliferation, anti-apoptosis, pro-angiogenesis, tumour invasion, metastasis and immune response-regulatory activities by interacting with cytokines, adhesion molecules, surface proteins and inducing critical survival signals (Jackson et al., 2017).