Pearson correlation analysis further demonstrated that upregulation of GINS4 in HCC was significant positively correlated with the expression of phosphoinositide-3-kinase, catalytic, betapolypeptide (PIK3CB, known as the coding gene of PI3K P110 subunit, R2 = 0.35, P < 0.0001), AKT1 (known as the coding gene of AKT subunit, R2 = 0.23, P < 0.0001) and MTOR (R2 = 0.27, P < 0.0001) as well as CCND1 (known as the coding gene of Cyclin D1 that can promote the G1/S phase transition of mitosis, R2 = 0.16, P < 0.0001) (Supplementary Figures 4A–D). Here, AKT1 is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.