HGF and pulmonary fibrosis: Numerous studies have demonstrated that HGF exerts therapeutic effects on diseases such as myocardial infarction, liver fibrosis, renal fibrosis, focal cerebral ischemia, and pulmonary fibrosis (Chaparro et al., 2015; Molnarfi et al., 2015; Ono et al., 2000; Wu et al., 2015; Feng et al., 2023).