Indeed, previous studies have confirmed that upregulation of YTHDF1 improve the migratory and invasive capabilities of HCC cells (30, 31), which provide clues for the investigation of circMAP2K4/miR-139-5p/YTHDF1 axis in the migration and metastasis of HCC in our future study. Here, YTHDF1 is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.