It is possible that this is a result of contamination due to the difficulty in sampling ‘normal’ colonic mucosa from FAP patients but a recent report by Obrador-Hevia et al (2010) showed abnormal expression of c-myc and repression of sFRP1 in macroscopically normal mucosa in patients with FAP, suggesting Wnt signalling pathway changes occur very early in FAP-associated tumourigenesis. The gene discussed is SFRP1; the disease is Familial adenomatous polyposis.