The Eighth Annual Research Conference of the American Institute for Cancer Research, held in Washington, D.C., September 3-4, 1998, was on the subject "Colon Cancer Prevention: Dietary Modulation of Cellular and Molecular Mechanisms," with participants representing various disciplines interested in this area. One of the speak- ers provided an appropriate quote from 17th century physician Thomas Adams: "Pre- vention is better than healing because it saves the labor of being sick," which aptly describes the need for the prevention of cancer. An overview of normal and abnormal colonic...