To validate the fibroblast subtype Fib-APSN, we explored fibroblast subtypes in HCC and found Fib-APSN was also tended to enrich in boundary region of the HCC samples, therefore fibroblast phenotype within the non-malignant region was disease-specific (Fig. 4p–s, Supplementary Fig. 6d, e). This evidence concerns the gene FBL and hepatocellular carcinoma.