The results demonstrated that 10 of 28 CpG sites located in the intron 1 of EYA2 were hypermethylated in HCC compared with the same intron in the matched adjacent tissues, and consequently the mRNA expression in the corresponding HCC tissues was significantly lower than that in the matched adjacent tissues (Fig. 4D–F, Additional file 2: Table S7). This evidence concerns the gene EYA2 and hepatocellular carcinoma.