Moreover, after the up-regulation of SALL4, the protein expressions of MMP2 and MMP9 in HepG2 and SMMC-7721 cells greatly rose, which also further suggested that SALL4 can enhance the migration and invasion of HepG2 and SMMC-7721 cells, and moreover, SALL4 mimic also increased the HCC tumor progression in nude mice experiment, identified the tumorigenicity of SALL4 in hepatic cancer. The gene discussed is MMP9; the disease is hepatocellular carcinoma.