Abstract: Objective To detect the protein expression levels of NF-κB and hTERT in esophagus epithelial canceration, and explore the related significance. Methods Immunohistochemistry was applied to detect NF-κB and hTERT protein expression in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma tissues (45 cases), atypical hyperplasia tissues (21 cases) and normal tissues (24 cases). SAS software was used to analyze the correlationship between NF-кB and hTERT protein expression in esophageal cancer tissues. Results hTERT protein expression in esophageal cancer tissues (88.9%) was significantly higher than those in atypical hyperplasia tissues (57.1%) and normal tissues (12.5%) (P<0.05). NF-κB protein expression in esophageal cancer (80.0%) was significantly higher than those in atypical hyperplasia tissues (57.1%) and normal tissues (20.8%) (P<0.05). NF-κB and hTERT protein expression had no correlationship with patients' age, gender, lymph node metastasis or tumor differentiation degree (P>0.05), but NF-кB expression had correlationship with invasion depth(P<0.01). Statistical results showed that NF-кB and hTERT protein expression rates in esophageal cancer tissues were significantly and positively correlated(P<0.05). Conclusion Abnormal expression of NF-κB and hTERT protein may be one of the factors for esophageal canceration. The joint detection of NF-κB and hTERT protein could provide objective index for early diagnosis and prognosis of esophageal cancer.