Gut microbes and their metabolites promote HCC formation and progression by activating signaling pathways such as LPS/TLR4 and phosphoinositide 3-kinase/protein kinase B/mechanistic target of rapamycin, thereby influencing hepatic immune responses, inflammatory responses, cell proliferation, and metastasis (Beyoğlu and Idle, 2022). Here, AKT1 is linked to hepatocellular carcinoma.