HOXB4 and neoplasm: Through bioinformatics analysis, we ascertained, for the first time, that MC-LR promoted HOXB4 up-expression in CRC cells and regulated the pathways in cancer, that HOXB4 expression was highly-regulated in CRC patients and was positively correlated with the poor prognosis of CRC, that there was a statistically positive correlation between HOXB4 expression and the tumor-infiltrating immune cells.