Human esophageal adenocarcinoma and cell lines derived from tumors can differ significantly in the amount of MUC2 mucin synthesized and these differences correlate with altered biochemical and biologic properties including those with relevance to invasion and metastasis, MUC2 is expressed in esophageal carcinoma cell lines, and patients with esophageal carcinomas characteristically present with advanced-stage disease[1,5,6]. The gene discussed is MUC2; the disease is esophageal adenocarcinoma.