Previous studies reported that hypoxia/HIF-1α-induced lincRNA-p21 is able to bind HIF-1α and pVHL and thus disrupts the VHL-HIF-1α interaction; SNHG11 binds to the pVHL recognition sites on HIF-1α, thus blocking the interaction of pVHL with HIF-1α and preventing its ubiquitination and degradation, resulting in the increased expression of HIF-1α target genes such as AK4, ENO1, HK2 and Twist1 in colorectal cancer 31. The gene discussed is AK4; the disease is colorectal cancer.