CD48 may play an important role in mediating the immune response in both immune activation and suppression, which binds to CD2 and is involved in a wide variety of innate and adaptive immune responses, and CD48 interaction with its high-affinity receptor 2B4 (CD244) leads to monocyte/macrophage-elicited NK cell dysfunction in HCC (46). Here, CD2 is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.