AFP binding to its receptors activates the cAMP-PKA pathway and induces Ca2+ influx, which promotes the expression of the c-fos, c-jun and Ras oncogenes and stimulates the growth of hepatoma cells (Li et al., 2002a,c; Ma et al., 2010; Wang et al., 2012; Zhang et al., 2012, 2015, 2016). Here, AFP is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.