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"An apple a day keeps the doctor away." Michael Bordonaro, Ph.D., associate professor of microbiology at The Commonwealth Medical College, wants to know why this is true.
Dr. Bordonaro is studying colorectal cancer, one of the most frequent cancers in the United States. This is particularly true in northeast Pennsylvania, where the rate for colon cancer is higher than the national average (even if one takes the aging population into account). Dr. Bordonaro believes that diet may be a contributing factor to the disease.
He started his study by examining cases of sporadic colorectal cancer (cases not inherited). Most of these cases, Dr. Bordonaro noted, were initiated by mutations in a signaling path called the "Wnt Signaling...