STAT3 and hepatocellular carcinoma: We identified known pathways involved in liver disease progression toward HCC development, such as the TNF-α/NF-κB pathway (RELA, FOS, CREB5, TNFA) (11, 18, 19), the proto-oncogene MYC (20), histone modifiers (HDAC9) (13), the IL-6/STAT3 pathways (14), and the PPAR gene family (ACSL3, NR1H3, PPARA) (21), confirming the validity of our approach (Tables 1 and 2).