Among all the genes that differentially expressed (logFC ≥ 1.5 or logFC ≤ −1.5 and FDR ≤ 0.05) in HPV-infected HNSCC patients (Supplementary Table S4), growth factor or relevant receptor genes NGF, CSF2, EREG, IL1F10, FGF19, and FGFBP2 were downregulated, whereas CSPG5, IGBPL1, IGFALS, and BMP3 were upregulated in HPV-infected tumors (Figure 3A). Here, NGF is linked to head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.