Professor Vogelstein explains that APC is expressed in all cells, and that we don't know why it only causes cancers when mutated in the colon and in a few other places.

Bert Vogelstein, M.D. is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and the Clayton Professor of Oncology and Pathology at Johns Hopkins University. His research focuses on the identification and characterization of genes that cause colon cancer. This has led to the discovery of the APC gene – the "gatekeeper" in colon cancer development. “APC is expressed in all cells. We don't know why it only causes cancers when mutated in the colon and in a few other places. We can speculate, and it really is speculation, that it does something a little bit different in the colon than in other tissues, but we really don't know that. It's even harder when you talk about mismatch repair genes, because we know exactly what mismatch repair genes – these genes were discovered in bacteria and have been studied in lower organisms for years and they do the same thing on every cell of the planet, and I literally mean every cell of the planet. They repair mistakes that are made as cells synthesize their DNA. Now why those – why a defective mismatch repair system should only lead to cancers in the colon and in the uterus predominantly, no one has the foggiest idea, and I can't give you any answer that I think even makes sense.”

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