在过去 20年中，食管癌一直是临床肿瘤学家和分子生物学、遗传学实验室所研究和关注的重点。尽管这样，食管癌的防治工作仍然很困难，它依然是世界上十大常见肿瘤之一。在亚洲国家食管癌多为鳞癌，而在西方国家食管腺癌却急剧增加，已占食管癌发病例数的 40％～ 50％。 　　目 Over the past 20 years, esophageal cancer has been the focus of research and attention by clinical oncologists and laboratories in molecular biology and genetics. Despite this, the prevention and treatment of esophageal cancer is still very difficult, and it is still one of the ten most common tumors in the world. In most Asian countries, esophageal cancer is squamous cell carcinoma, but esophageal adenocarcinoma in Western countries has increased dramatically, accounting for 40% to 50% of cases of esophageal cancer. Head