AFP and hepatocellular carcinoma: Also, their elevation showed a significant anti-apoptotic effect on HCC cells such as HCC-9204 and SMMC-7721 in vitro (L. Yang et al., 2002; Yao et al., 2012) The decrease of Bax, Bad and other pro-apoptotic members in HCC tissues is associated with adverse clinical features such as vascular invasion, tumor differentiation and AFP (Hu et al., 2015; Garcia et al., 2002).