Figure 4.

(A) A diagram of the histologically observable disease progression of colorectal cancer. In this progression, polypectomy brings the patient back to the initial healthy state. (B) Incorporating nanostructural alterations and field carcinogenesis into the colorectal cancer (CRC) progression provides an additional framework to explore cancer progression and detection. In this framework, polypectomy reduces risk of CRC progression and returns the patients to a microscopically healthy state, but there are persistent nanostructural and molecular alterations that maintain an elevated CRC risk compared to a completely healthy patient.