ME2 and hepatocellular carcinoma: ME2 wild-type significantly promoted the colony formation ability of HCC cells with ME2 knockdown, whereas ME2-R67K significantly promoted the colony formation ability, stemness of the cells, invasive metastasis, and HCC cell activity of HCC cells with ME2 knockdown, according to the results of the CCK-8 assay, cell suspension assay, Transwell assay, and cell scratch assay (Fig. 4B–E).