Moreover, CTCs exhibited higher expression of HBA1/2, which is consistent with our finding that ectopic expression of the AST factors induced HBA1/2 in AST cells and with recent reports showing that hemoglobin facilitates breast cancer CTCs to suppress anoikis and form distant metastases [17, 18] (Fig. 4N, S5C). This evidence concerns the gene HBA1 and breast carcinoma.