VEGFA and hepatocellular carcinoma: We used ELISA kit to detect the VEGF secretion in the culture supernatant of HCC cells (SK-Hep1 and Hep-3B) and found that the VEGF secretion of HCC cells was significantly increased upon hypoxic challenge compared with the normoxic conditions, while ASP could effectively suppress the VEGF secretion of HCC cells under hypoxic conditions in a dose-dependent manner (Figure 2A).