VEGFA and cancer: Furthermore, in pathological contexts like inflammation and cancer, PI3K/AKT signaling augments the fibroblast secretion of inflammatory mediators (e.g., IL-6, IL-1β) (Lee et al., 2021; Hou et al., 2021; Lin et al., 2021), drives the pro-tumorigenic reprogramming of CAFs (Fang et al., 2023; Zhou et al., 2018; Abdul-Wahid et al., 2018) and facilitates vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-mediated angiogenesis (Wang FT et al., 2024; Jiang et al., 2024).